Navigating This Blog

For Your Navigational Pleasure...

The Entries on Blogger are automatically formatted to appear in Ascending Order.

In other words, the first Entry is located at the bottom of the Blog, with each successive Entry located above the earlier one.  So you have to keep scrolling up, from one entry to the next.

That's a lot of work, don't you think?

I do, so I've come up with an easier way to Navigate.

At the end of each Chapter, there is a Go-To Link that, when clicked, will automatically take you to the next Chapter.

The example below is the actual Go-To Link to the next Chapter (so use it!)...

End of Navigation Instructions

Go to: Forward: A Quiet Little Conversation  

(Smart, ain't I?)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The Fine Print

Copyright © 2019 Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

All rights reserved. No part of the Text displayed on this Blog may be reproduced or utilized by any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photographic "screen shots", photo copying/printing, or by any other information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the author. 

Please send all inquires to the author by Email.

Afterward: My new Job

Oct. 1st, 2019 I had a sudden Inspiration, whispered into my soul by Jean Baptist - along with the strongest sense of Babalu Aye's immediate Presence beside me.

You see, I have recently been studying Haiti's history - necessary to better understand the Unfoldment of Vodou.  In the process, I happened to come across a distressing statistic:

Haiti now has the second-highest
per capita rate of AIDS in the world ...
just behind Africa. 

This pierces my heart to the core, as I've lost nearly all my adulthood friends to AIDS, and  suffer from Holocaust Survivor's Syndrome myself as a result.

As for Haiti, most folks struggling with Aids in that country are not well-treated.  

Nearly 50% do not receive medical treatment, due to the Stigma attached to homosexuality there now.  Folks ignorantly assume anyone with AIDS must be a homosexual.  A Stigma that often results in violent, even deadly, consequences.

A Stigma being the result of the massive deluge of ignorant, racially-challenged "Christians" swarming into post-earthquake Haiti (the earthquake that took my Jean-Baptist from me).  

For the past nine years they have  with their Bibles and their "sexual morality" indoctrinations.  Thank you very much, "Christians".

-  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -

The Inspiration - the Calling - that came to me is that I am now to be making a main focus of my Voodou Bokor Work on the Healing of AIDS in Haiti.  

Babalu Aye, Patron of all epidemics, 

acquired diseases & conditions.

And having Babalu Aye, standing with me, I know my little Voodou Magickal efforts will be enormously empowered.  Grateful Respects and Love for you, Babalu Aye!

For more information about Babalu Aye CLICK HERE

Perhaps this is the reason I've told you my Story:  to ask you to join my project in your own way, from you own heart.

Any Prayers, Magicks, Rituals, Voodous, Conjurings, Hoodoo, Vibratory Healings - even occasional  momentary Best-of-Thoughts you can lend in this pursuit will add tremendously to the efficacy of this effort to end the AIDS epidemic in Haiti.

Beni Ou,
Dieudonne Bokor

You've reached the end of this Blog.
Thanks for reading it!

              Please enjoy visiting my perpetually-evolving
Diary of an American Bokor blog.
                


Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

As The World Turns & Turns & Turns ... (Act 6 - Finale)

On Monday, January 12, 2010 at just about 4:00 in the afternoon, I had the most overwhelming anxiety/panic experience, for no obviously apparent reason.  

But I knew something unimaginably horrific had  happened to Jean-Baptist, because I heard his voice cry out to me at that moment.

I frantically tried calling Haiti, repeatedly getting "busy" signals.

You see, on that day, and at that time, Jean-Baptist was crushed to death in the devastating earthquake that crumbled Port-au-Prince into concrete rubble.  and I knew it, the moment it happened.

 

I knew he was gone, yet my mind insisted on proof.  Just like when my dad died, I insisted on seeing his body - instinctively knowing this would give me a strong sense of closure.  It did, then.  

So I begged and cajoled the Haitian authorities with countless phone calls for over nine excruciatingly frustrating years.

The world I had finally come to greet with hope and childlike expectation came to an end.  I was literally, in every way and on every level, utterly stunned ... utterly alone.

But, girding up my proverbial loins, I tried to go on - at least acting like a live human being.  Most of the time, I slept.  Too much  of the time, I ate.  I was constantly on edge, anxious and emotionally labile.  Most of the time tears were backed-up, ready to flood my eyes.

Yet as the minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years passed, I've slowly started to remember how to breathe.  Over time, I started to be able to read (if disinterestedly), and even began to almost enjoy my daily walks again.

And so the world turns...

At some point, I started doing a little Magick again.  And after a little longer time, I began approaching and serving the Lwa again.  They gave me more comfort than I even imagined possible.  I now know it would have been better had I approached them sooner.

And so it goes, as the world turns 'round & 'round...

 

In the years that pass, grief for the dead never dies.  In my experience, we just get a little more numb as the minutes, hours, days, weeks,  months and years go by.

As time went on (and on and on and on...) I stood a little straighter, stepped with a little more surety.  My mind became more vital, and my vitality became more mindful.

I increasingly worked more diligently to deepen my relationships with and service to the Lwa - a two-sided coin emotionally: great joyful connections, countered with the grief of the enormous loss of my Jean-Baptist.

More recently I've again taken-up Nichiren-shū Buddhism, which I'd formerly practiced, with enormous efficacy.  (After trying the associated mantra out - Jean-Baptist said it is "like an amazing light-switch making Ache really large!")

But ... and isn't there always a "but"?...

But ... my every moment of every day continued to remain discolored by Grief, Loss, and an Infinite Alone-ness with only a fading memory-ghost of  Jean-Baptist always at the edge of my mind's eye.  

And yet ... (and thank you, Bondye, for the "yets we gets") ...

Just a few days after my sibling brother, Richard, died from cancer in September of 2019, I finally ... after nine long, frustrating years ... received official confirmation from Haiti that Jean-Baptist indeed went anbla dlo ("under the water" = died) in Port-au-Prince where he was taking care of his parents when that damned Earthquake hit.  

Finally knowing for sure now, there were Tears of Grief mingled with Tears of Relief.

The best was yet to come...

Later the same day his death was confirmed,  Jean-Baptist came to me, in the old way - in a Visitation.  

It was the first other-dimensional  Visitation in over 14 years.  We both simply knew and accepted this was also to be our final such Visitation in this lifetime.

We cried together, each for each other, and each for ourselves.  He told me of his love for me ... his Dieudonne.  My heart sang to him my aching love for him ... mari mwen pi renmen.

Holding a love-tender gossamer-light Vision-finger to my lips, he said, "It's time. Let's do it. Now."

And we did do it - in that dimension I still cannot describe or name even now.

First, Jean-Baptist gave me an extraordinary kind of Kanzo - literally putting Bokor Asagwe empowerment into my head, connecting me fully and directly with the Lwa of his Mayaka Family, resulting in a kind of "route of consciousness" more directly to my Lwa Met Tet - as well as exponentially increasing my Magical Ability ... an awesome, and painfully intense spiritual  experience. 

During the Kanzo, he offered me his other-dimensional Asson which he guided me in caring for, and using it as he did as a Bokor/Sorcerer. 

A little time afterward, I obtained, bathed, fed & named, and consecrated my own physical Asson which is now the manifest twin to  the other-dimensional one Jean Baptist offered to me.  

As I previously mentioned, converse to the traditions of most Vodou Hounfors, this Asson does not also carry the symbolic signification of Houngan status.  Rather, it is somewhat akin to a Wizard's Magick Wand.  I am not a Makaya  Houngan kind of Bokor. I am just the Sorcerer kind of Bokor.

Then came the most important ritual 

for me, in this lifetime ...

We did it ourselves, and we did it together.  We celebrated our own spontaneous Voodou-Sacred Eternal Matrimony - at which many Lwa so kindly attended and surrounded us.  We are now Always Together.  We are now Never Apart.  

Can you understand that?  I can, almost...

Now I am not a Widower.
Now, and forever, I am 

Dieudonne Bokor Zanmi Ak Sevite Tout Lwa; 
Sosyete Grot La Nan Lespri Sakre...

(Dieudonne Bokor Friend and Servant of the Lwa;  

Society of the Grotto of Sacred Spirits...)

...the Mari Etenel of Jean-Baptist Bokor 💖

E mwen renmen nou enfiniman ak etenelman 
cheri John-Baptist!

~ Li Fini ~

This is the End of My Story
Please go to:  Afterward: My New Job



Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

The Best Laid Plans (Act5)

"Change is the only constant in life. (Heraclitus)

It was the fall of 2009.  Jean-Baptist and I were love-dancing along, playfully minding our own businesss, when we suddenly got side-swiped.  Bondye had other plans for us...

A telegram came from Haiti:  "Dad dying Mom going down come now Daniel"

A Short Family Profile:
These are the things Jean Baptist had told me about his family ...

• Jean-Baptist and his brother, Daniel, were raised by their moderately well-off parents, in Port-au-Prince.

• Their father, Makeson Bozor, was 18 years older than Esther, their mother.  Before his decline, he was a hale & hearty man, even in his senior years, tho' he smoked and drank to excess.

• Esther, however was like a delicate flower, often emotionally labile - shifting from the depths of despair to the buzzing heights of near manic ecstacies.  Behind the times in science and medicine, Haiti could not offer her any substantial relief.  Jean Baptist did what he could to help his mother with herbs, but she frequently refused them saying the usually very bitter concoctions hurt her tongue.

• Exteriorly, the Bozors were good, abiding Catholics ... like most Vodouisants.  If nudged a bit, Mrs. Bozor would quietly admit, "Mwen sèvi Lwa" ("I serve the Lwa”).

• Daniel was the older brother - smart, proud and lazy, he refused to truly participate in his own life, other than drinking and catting about.  A "perpetual university student," Daniel was still living at his parent's in his mid-40s when he sent the telegram telling Jean Baptist of their father's mortal illness.

• The younger boy, Jean-Baptist always kept busy, interested in learning everything about anything, and his pride in learning was reflected in his youthful, brash attitude - usually to his parent's embarrassment.
  At 15, Jean-Baptist left home to make his own unique way in life.  He wasn't at all used to the sudden poverty, but boldly dived into life on his own.
  
  Having lived in a Haitian-typical, publicly-Catholic/privately-Vodou home, created a deep longing to learn everything about what he most craved, living a life of Vodou.
  
• He became totally immersed in a Makaya Socyete (attracted by their emphasis on Magick) doing everything he could to prove his authentic desire - from cooking to decorating the Peristyle for Seremoni; from turning-over the latrines, to  cleaning the costumes and accoutrements for the Loa to use when they attended a Rite through Possession.

• In a short time he was approved to take Kanzo, oddly receiving both Hounsi and Si Pwen Kanzos both within days of each other.  

• Jean Baptist served for another year before his Mambo endowed him with Asogwe Kanzo, as he was already displaying many of the attributes necessary to act as an initiating Houngan and  became that kind of (Makaya) Bokor.

• After quite some time serving in that Hounfor, Jean-Baptist surrendered to a longing he had largely ignored: it required becoming independent from his Makaya family and "going solo.".  He did so tenderly, and remained a well-wishing friend of that Hounfor.
  
• Utterly unafraid of the Darker Things of Vodou and Magick - even apparently spiritually  protected in every kind of circumstance  -  he decided to serve the Lwa by serving the people as the other kind of Bokor ... the Sorcerer kind of Bokor.

• Successfully plying his trade in a small adobe hut on a little plot of dry land, he quickly paid the landlord off becoming the owner of his (and thus his Lwa's) abode .

• Jean-Baptist sporadically visited his family, helping his father with home repairs and giving his mother emotional encouragement.

• He boldly cut through the bureaucracy of officially changing  his last name (Bozor) to Bokor by insisting they - the bureaucrats - had made a previous spelling error!

-   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   

I knew Jean-Baptist must return alone to Haiti to help his family in their distress. 

Taking comfort and encouragement from each other, we agreed this was not the time for us to go to Haiti together. Immigrating to a third-world country can be a challenging adventure in cognitive dissonance.

• I was still too early in the process of preparing for that life-change and, quite frankly, would have been an unnecessary distraction to the situation in Haiti at that time.

Jean-Baptist also looked forward to having a chance to work on repairs and upgrades - preparing his tin-roofed adobe hut in which we would spend our Haitian life together.

Before he left for Haiti, to further my advancement in Vodou, with his sweet, loving direction and support, I underwent a condensed preparatory "Magickal Interior Vision-Quest" kind of experience called Couche - considered an absolute necessary preparation for initiation in most Haitian and some American Voodou Hounfors.  

He then gave me the Makaya-Vodou equivalent of a Si Pwen Asogwe, stepping-up my ability to channel and direct significantly increased flows of Ache - as well as heightening my awareness of, and friendship with the  Lwa.

"That should hold you for awhile, yes" he said. 

And so it goes ...

So it went the after our too short of a time together, Jean-Baptist  flew back to Haiti leaving me alone in the Silence of Hopeful Love-in-Separation.

And so it goes again ...

We kept in touch pretty regularly for the first month or so, thanks to our mutual mobile service's cheap, almost unlimited cell phone service.  "Regularly" - ha!  That's really relative, when you're dealing with the less than optimal cellular capabilities of that time in Haiti.

!  !  !  

Suddenly the world, and my heart, and my life came to a screeching halt...

(and I stopped breathing)

!  !  !

End of Act 5
Go to:  As The World Turns & Turns & Turns... (Act 6)

Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

We Played Like Children (Act 4)

Our time together included a lot of learning on both our parts.  Effortless - pain-free - because it was really more like we were playing together.

Jean Baptist did a divination, and confirmed that Mambo Jolene Jackson had correctly identified my Lwa Met Tet, on the occasion of my Lav Tet in California.

I'm not going to tell you who that Lwa is.  It's considered a confidential secret, kept closely-guarded by most authentic Voodouisants. 

He also told me that Babalu Aye (a Lwa in some Voodou Socyetes, but more widely known as a Santeria  Orisha) was standing next to me.

Prior to this, the only reference I had to Babalu Aye was Ricky Ricardo singing Babalu Aye! on television's I Love Lucy!  

But I was wrong.  Jean-Baptist showed me a postcard picture of Bablu, and I was floored!  

Back in my Elementary School days, I made myself a Halloween costume, in what Mom called one of my "crazy-kid moods" - covering my entire body with long sheaths of raffia ... probably inspired by Thing in the Addams Family cartoon books and TV program.   

I looked very much like this:

This is Babalu Aye!

We worked together, played together, we danced and we planned together ... and oh, how we planned! ...

We planned on going home to beautiful Haiti.  I say home, because that would be the best place for us together, despite the intrinsic harshness of life there.

Jean-Baptist had become fairly a well known (and feared by some) Bokor in his neighborhood  because of his successful Vodou-centric Magickal help giving folks their yearnings, desires and needs. 

His Magick was usually on the "Light" side of the spectrum between so-called "White" and "Black" Magicks.  Like American Hoodoos and Conjures, he had no problem dealing with violent spouses, throwing terrible curses back on the ones who sent them, and so on.  The fact that such Magicks had positive intentions for the ones requesting the Works had a lot to do with his willingness to help.

On that note, it is good to be aware that some of the darkest Magicks were stirred up to incite and strengthen the Haitian slaves' Revolution against their oppressors.

Jean-Baptist never became involved in the more terrible of the Zoobop, Bizango, or Sanpwel Socyetes - especially because of his firm resolve never to participate in the taking of human life, or the slavery of Zombification of persons or souls separated from their bodies in death.

Zombie Troll

This was the aspect of Vodou Bokorism he  strongly advised me to also refuse.

Together in Haiti, we would settle-in as partners in the business of providing an even larger menu of Bokor services while living together openly as Spouses (a possibility no longer easily attainable in Haiti, thanks to the onslaught of evangelical "Christians" and their relentless proselytism, starting after the Earthquake, thank you very much).

We also dreamed of somehow healing the rifts between the various Peristyles - their Leaders and congregants - knowing that in the transcendent there is always room for variations of beliefs, practices, and benign competition.  We even came up with a name for that effort: "The Integration Creation." 

We also talked about the idea of grounding a new Voodou Socyete, based on the combination of American Creole Voudou and Haitian Vodou.  
It was to be called Sosyete Du Grot nan Lespri Sakren® (Society of the Grotto of Sacred Spirits) - even registering and protecting that name so it couldn't be co-opted and used by  unscupulous, money-hungry self-proclaimed Voudou "leaders".

While Bokors as Sorcerers are essentially  independent, Jean-Baptist had retained very friendly connections with the Makaya Socyete wherein he had received training and Kanzos previous to becoming an independent Bokor.

Before leaving Haiti to come to me, he had arranged with the Mambo of that Peristyle to preside at a rarely-performed Vodou Marriage Seremoni, when we came to dwell in Haiti.

A Sidenote:
Makaya is one of the many different and unique Vodou traditions of Haitian Voodou. 

The Makaya practices - including initiation processes - are less uniform than most other denominations of Vodou, with a stronger emphasis on Magick than on Religion.  Their Works of Magick, in behalf of those in need, is their greatest service to the Lwa.

In this rite, Kanzo (initiations) are less elaborate and the priest or priestess does not receive the Ason (sacred rattle) as a symbol of priesthood (as well as a kind of Power Tool).  A Makaya priest isn't called an Houngan, rather being called a Bokor, with the priestess referred to as Mambo, or Sorceress. 

Jean-Baptist eventually received Asogwe status in the above-mentioned Socyete, so he became that kind of Bokor.

There is another kind of Bokor too ...

This kind of Bokor is an independent expert in both malevolent and benevolent Magicks, using his abilities to provide vitality, love, healing, even to to restore life, as well as to cripple, harm and unfortunately, too many Bokors are believed to have caused the end of  life.  (Example: Many Haitians believe that Zombies are always made by Bokors).

This type of Bokor's relationship with the Lwa is unabashedly vibrant - with the walls of their domicile often displaying drawings, names and praises to certain Lwa - both "hot" and "cool". Their relationships with the Spirits are very personal and rarely discussed others, except when instructing a client on their participation in obtaining the desired goal.

The Asson (sacred rattle) is sometimes taken-up - not as a traditional symbol of priesthood, but for its other use, as an intimately-connected living tool for generating, modulating, focusing and magnifying Magickal Forces of Power wielded by the Bokor.

That kind of Bokor is essentially a for-hire Specialist of Sorcerery and, because they deal with Magicks both dark and light, actually more feared than respected. 

Jean-Baptist is also that kind of Bokor...


End of Act 4
Go To: The Best Laid Plans (Act 5)

Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

Are You Kidding? (Act 3)

What?  Me?  Catholic?

Are You Kidding?

Me?  A Gay guy, a homo, a fairy, a faggot ... a once upon a time major player in the Gay Liberation  movement?

... join a religion that at best, considers Homosexuals to be disordered ... and at worst, has condemned Homosexuals to an excruciating eternity in Hell - because their God, doncha know, HATES Queers?  Really?  You've got to be kidding!

Yessiree,  that was my first reaction to Jean-Baptist's proclamation.

Suddenly, I questioned the Visions ... was I just delusional? 
And, for the first time, I questioned Jean-Baptist's  identity ... was he who he said he was - who I thought I knew him to be?  Or was he some malignant entity hell-bound to make my heart shatter and my brain melt-down? 

.

Calm down, he said.
How? I asked.

Breathe. Right. Now. he said, Stop holding your breath.

 So I breathed.  And I could feel my heart slowing, and my brain cooling ...

Then Jean Baptist reached out and held me in his love-tender, gossamer-light Vision-arms. 

And he told & showed me the myriad people, some with skin darker than midnight, who were violently ripped away from their homelands - crammed & stacked into the dark, airless bowels of huge ships - and when stranded in strange lands, living and dying as slaves of white and light-skinned barbarians.

And he showed & told me of the Spirit-People who crossed the seas with them, and upheld them, encouraged and empowered them.

The Lwa!

Then I understood a little more clearly.  I had been a little aware about how African slaves hid their worship, masking the Lwa behind Catholic icons.  Syncretizing an ancient religion with the saints of an enforced religion of the Catholic church, in order to survive ...

This image is actually a Santeria icon.

It includes Orishas that correspond to Lwa, and is 
revered by many Voudouists including Marie Laveau

... in order for their secretly persisting, abiding and growing Religion ... as slaves from many tribes integrated their knowledge and practices of Vodun ... making what flourished over time, into Vodou.

Jean-Baptist also reminded me of something I used to know, in so long a Childhood time ago, and intuitively understood ... the Catholic Mass is the Greatest  Act of Magick in the Western World ...

... in which heaven bows down, and Bondye descends, to become food and drink to enter into us, nourishing us in every way. 

"You must become Catholic," he said.  "Like us...like we have been before, like we will be again."

A Short Theology Break:

• Voodou essentially believes Bondye, God, created everything, breathing life into all living creatures, but is remote to us, being busy with other cosmic responsibilities here, and in other universes.
• But he hasn't abandoned us, because s/he made the Lwa, who are, like angels, our guides, guardians and protectors.
• The unspoken question most people are too polite to ask, is: "But isn't Jesus, who comes down in Catholic Holy Communion, God?" 
• The answer is:  Jesus is God the Son of God the Father.  And God being God, is always absolute.  So yes, Jesus the Son is absolutely God - Bondye.
• It doesn't matter what names we call God: Jesus, Krishna, Olodumare, Bondye.  God is always, absolutely God.
• When the Africans were stolen from their homelands, the Lwa crossed the waters with them.  In their new prison lands, the Slaves were forced to become Catholics. How "coincidental" that the Catholic faith has a plethora of Saints, many of them having symbolic correspondences to the Lwa - thus there many Saints the slaves could hide within those Saints - thus making invisible the true objects of their worship invisible, appearing to worship like any proper Catholic ... thus saving their own lives, whilst perpetuating and growing their inheritance that became Voodou.
• The "Great Coincidence of Grace" is that, along with being possessed ("filled") with the Lwa, Bondye has seen fit to add her/his help, by coming down to be substantially present in the Catholic Holy Communion, to fill (possessing and "being possessd by") the African slaves, adding a whole new dimension to the words Mercy, Patience and Forgiveness.

(There really are no accidents you know)

Having realized all this, I knew why Jean-Baptist insisted I be confirmed a Catholic ... so I, too, could join my Voodou family in being filled ("possessed") with Bondye, as well as being possessed ("filled") with the Lwa.

So in utter Love and utter Trust I agreed to become an authentic Catholic, so that I could authentically become fully of Voodou.

• I think the hardest part of it for me was hiding the real reason for the sudden "conversion" from my beloved friends and partners in Magick - as I let go of so many occult objects - accoutrements I had come to cherish:  Talking Boards, Wands, Pentagram-inscribed-jewelry  and Reiki-treatment Tables - as well as nearly all my former friends ...

I dived-in (recklessly?) dancing through the process of preparing for initiation into the Catholic Church.

Our Visitations stopped temporarily, by mutual agreement, during that time of preparation, to allow me to fully focus on the task at-hand. 

So I Was Initiated

According to photographer Lynn Warberg, who documented Haitian Vodou for over ten years, a common saying on the island is that:

"Haiti is 70% Catholic, 30% Protestant, and 100% Vodou."

On Saturday night April 22, 2000 about an hour  after I was confirmed a Catholic, the Visitations began again.  

They were less frequent, and more relaxed, but tho' intimate and totally love-embued - they were barely enough to keep me (and Jean-Baptist) sane.  I diligently continued my Voodou studies and practices, with the added facet of Catholic teachings and beliefs.

~ From Knowing Him To Loving Him ~

Over eight years later, now relocated somewhere in America's Heartland, while recovering from four strokes in my aging but not-yet entirely-melted brain ... Jean-Baptist came to me one more time.

In a Catholic Church, just as Mass started, he came - but not in a Visitation Vision ...  

I was sitting alone, in a pew.  I heard a man with that most beautiful Caribbean accent politely asking to sit with me.

Turning to respond, I had the soul-leaping experience some folks call "jumping out of my skin."

My mouth flew open to cry out.  His love-tender tangible fingers lightly touched his lips and mine, to quiet me.

We sat together, Jean-Baptist and me, finally 100% together (again) after a lifetime apart - our mortal bodies leaning into each other.  

Standing, sitting, kneeling, and standing again, together - every movement in a perfectly spontaneous synchronization of intimacy, relief, and love's ecstacy.

He held my hand throughout the Mass, even during the time it took us to approach and receive the Holy Sacrament - in which Bondye entered us in Communion ... just as the Lwa have entered us in Possession.

After the priest gave the final blesssing, we stood, genuflected together, and hand-in-hand, left the building.

-  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -

Now substantially together in life - one more time again - we spent almost every bliss-filled moment of every day and night with each other.

Our time together was filled with big smiles and  laughter, as well as seriouness, as we shared and taught each other our knowledge and practices ... 

... mine being the practices of American Voudou & Hoodoo ... his being the practices of a Haitian Vodou Bokor.  

Our mutual pursuit unfolded as an integration of American Voudou and Haitian Vodou.

Thus came the new word - a neologism I've made, of integrated spellings - Voodou! 

End of Act 3 

Go to:  We Played Like Children (Act 4)


Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

Seeing Is Believing (Act 2)

~ And So It Goes ~

On October 1st of 97, I landed in (of all the unlikely places) Arkansas.

Say what you like about the place, but it was the perfect venue for me to continue healing from the potentially mind-crushing conundrum in which I'd become entangled. 

It was there that I met a couple, in their SpellCrafting shop, who claimed to be High Priest and Priestess of a Witch's coven.  Their store offered lots of beautiful handmade (Western) Magickal tools and other objects - many of which I purchased, and all of which worked just wonderfully.

He claimed to be hereditary Witch, as too many such folks do.  She was less forthright about her Wiccan roots, tho' time revealed a pretty  superficial  interest in Voodoo.

I'm not knocking them here.  In fact I cherish the time we shared together.  Yet I do believe there are some valuable friendships that come with embedded expiration dates.

Anyway, I dived (recklessly?) into their Witchcraft doings - using my Western Magickal name with my associates - and for the most part kept my Voudou-leanings to myself, still working diligently, privately, serving the Lwa.

The Visitations started shortly after said Priest & Priestess left the area and things got "veddy interesting" ...

From Seeing Him

To Knowing Him

In late 1998 I began having Visitations with an extraordinarily beautiful black man.  He called himself Jean-Baptist Bokor.  

And from the first of it, he called me Dieudonne  ("Gift From God") - never by my Western or Magickal names.

He was a Haitian fellow who looked to be in his 20s.  (I soon found out he was actually in his mid-30s.)

The difference between Visitations ("Visions") and dreams is that you are awake rather than asleep.  And the senses not only of sight, but also those of smell, taste and touch are more substantial than in dreams, tho' less so than in ordinary consciousness.

The first cycle of Visitations took place over a period of about twelve months.

Here are some of the things Jean-Baptist revealed about him and me together, on which I came to understand and agree:

• We were originally created as One "Soul" and, at some time in Eternity, we became separated by the pleasure of Bondye ... and have continuously come together, life-after-life, in myriad  times and circumstances, and will do so until we are fully United again at some time in eternity, by Bondye's pleasure, for the rest of Eternity. There are some folks who want to name what we are "Twin Flames" - but we are not that.  We are not "twins" at all. We are One Flame temporarily divided into Two; each unique - not opposites - we are the perfect compliment of each other.  
• Some lifetimes back, we lived in bondage as Haitian male slaves - secretly, lovers - and were both killed fighting in the same rebellion against our oppresssors.  This took place during the "Vodou Revolution" that eventually made Haiti a slave-free African-indigenous, independent  country.
• In a more recent life, we were freemen in New Orleans.  We anticipated a secret Matrimonial Seremoni planned by our Voodou Societe.  Unfortunately, I died of Yellow Fever before we could be so married.
• In this lifetime, we have taken some time coming together - he being a Haitian Vodou Bokor (Sorcerer) named Jean Baptist in Haiti, and me being...well...me, in America.
• It was his Vodou Bokor-driven psychically-informed Intention, (and quickly  became my Magickal & Voodoo Intention as well) to remedy our being apart - once and for all, now and forever. 
  
  I had been consciously aware that there was someone - the perfect someone for me.  In fact, when I was very young, I had glimpses of him.  So that, when the Visitation Visions began, I - now an adult - knew that I somehow knew Jean-Baptist, felt comfortable and trusting of him.

As the days rolled by, we looked closely at what we each were "working on" - which was our Voodou way of life.  Knowing I knew very little about Haitian Vodou, which is very different from American Voudou, I asked Jean-Baptist to "take me there."  He did, as I "took him" here, into American Voudou.

As that process unfolded, it became more a feeling of "Oh, I remember that" than being taken into totally foreign landscapes.  

Then Came The Punchline...

 One evening during a Visitation in early September of '99, Jean-Baptist told me he wanted me to join the Catholic Church!

W. T. F.???

End of Act 2
Go to: Are You Kidding? (Act 3)

Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to My Life (Act 1)

It started out as a "Magick Thing" for me...

Being nearly obsessively into in All Things Tarot, in early 1992 I came across a recently published  Tarot book & deck in a San Francisco bookshop.

 The New Orleans Voodoo Tarot turned my whole Magickal Life & World upside-down. 

Having been active in various forms of Western Magick - with increasing depths of understanding, and degrees of participation through most of my life - I experienced the "intuitive-tingle" that informed me this would be a substantial extension of my journey.

Not a week later, I came across Luisah Teish's Yoruba-spiced Jambalaya.

Subtitled "The Natural Woman's Book of Personal Charms and Practical Rituals" Luisah invites men who are strong enough in their worldview to include women equally in the human race [my words] to enjoy the book as well.

That summer, California Bay Area Witchcraft leader Starhawk, and Louisa Teish conducted a Grand Magickal Night of Dance & Ritual on the beach, which I was blessed to attend.  That night I accepted, in my heart and in my mind,  that I was now a Vodouisant.

These books and other books and events cut a new, wider & deeper Life Road on which I continue to dance with near-childlike, excitement & anticipation.

I learned that, Voodoo needn't involve bloody sacrifices without losing Ache.  This is called Manje sek.

At first, it was solely the Magick of Voudou that remained my focus of study & understanding and practice & experience.

A most important facet of Voudou I quickly came to love - not ordinarily included in Western Magick - is the developing of one's awareness of continued relationship with the Ancestors ... a vital thread running through all forms of Voodou.  This was the segue to my budding understanding of Voodoo's religious nature.

It was only after some time spent also becoming familiar with, and serving some of the Lwa that I felt  comfortable enough to request their help and guidance in both my Magickal works and ordinary life circumstances.   

During a beautiful Voudou rite in Oakland, on June 23rd, St. John's Eve in 1996, I was given a Lav Tet  by the elderly Voudou Queen Jolene Jackson, whom I had come to love and respect in the months since first meeting & studying with her in Oakland.  

She also told me who my Lwa Met Tet is, whose identity was a total surprise ... I never even imagined being so honored and blessed by that wonderful Lwa. 

I can't tell the name of my Lwa Met Tet - however, I am able to tell you that Queen Joleen also divined that Marie Laveau walks beside me.

We mutually agreed that I wasn't yet prepared to accept Kanzo but that the Lav Tet would ease my way into Voodoo ... Hounsi Kanzo would come at a later time.

But that time would not come easily.

While my then-partner of 17 years, Scott, was consistently losing-ground in his struggle with AIDS,  I was increasingly struggling with my own suffering of "Holocaust Survivor Syndrome."

Additionally, tho' he was entirely non-spiritually-minded, Scott put up with the many twists and turns of my spiritual journey.  Yet his tolerance came to a screeching halt when it came to my interest and  participation in Voudou.  Thank you, Racist Hollywood films and Pulp Fiction trash that has made Voudou a superstitiously frightening religion to far too many good folks.

Eventually, a series of terrible circumstances and events (including Scott's passing) - and my collapsed, dysfunctional response to it all - had so skewed my perceptions that I felt trapped in a distorted world made of broken Fun House Mirrors. 

It took leaving San Francisco for those  distortions of perception to fade away altogether.

Just a few days before my journey out of California ... convinced that Kanzo would straighten-out my head, as well a strengthening me to courageously face my demons, and continue my Voudou journey safely (including stabilizing my body's and my mind's recovery from the spontaneous Possession experiences to which I've been susceptible since early adolescence) ...  with her sister Marguerite attending, Mama Jolene gave me Hounsi Kanzo.

Honor, respects and love for you, Queen Jolene!

End of Act 1.
Go to: Seeing Is Believing (Act 2)


Copyright © 2019, Dieudonne Bokor (aka W.A. Ryan)