Although the history of the area was fraught with frightful stories of a warring people and head hunting, in recent years, contact with the outside world had pacified the tribes. The occasional anthropologist would find his way into the jungle to study the culture and return with incredible tales. Indians living in isolated jungle areas could accurately describe street corners in Quito where they had never been, even drawing the letters of shop names when they could neither read nor write. The natives drew pictures of people with auras or halos above their heads. Shamans gave explicit descriptions of the location of lost articles. Tales of flying were reported. All of this was attributed to the ingestion of a potion made from several vines, generally in the genus Banisteriopsis. In Ecuador and Peru, where the ancient language of the Inca was still spoken, it was called by its Quechua name, ayahuasca—the vine of the dead.
“Let us hurry,” said the guide, Luis. “We need to cross the river. I want to reach Mana’s compound before night comes.”
Jerry took a drink from his canteen and stepped beside Dr. Miller and Barry Hume, the graduate student in anthropology he’d been introduced to months before. Each man picked up his pack and fell in single file behind Luis, the bearers behind them. Overhead, black clouds began to form. Soon, the afternoon rain fell, hard and gray, shaking the jungle with its shattering impact. In an hour, it was over, but even before pieces of blue sky peeked through the canopy, steam was rising from the ground and vaporizing off Jerry’s pants and shirt. White wisps of mist rose from farther valleys. The mosquitoes began to hum.
Crossing the river was not difficult. Hastily built rafts floated their equipment across. The rapids were swift—somewhat swollen from the rain, but manageable—and the water was cold and welcome. Yet ten minutes after resuming the march, they were covered with perspiration, fighting insects, and scratching old bites.
The light began to fade. Luis picked up the pace, concerned about spending the night unprotected when they were so close to shelter.
Ahead, on a hill with a view of the surrounding country, the party finally encountered two oval-shaped homes with thatched roofs. The walls were made of palm staves set inches apart. Two doors that could be fortified against enemy attack were set into the lodge, one at the far end for the men, the other on the opposite end for the women. Luis called out, identifying himself.
Night had almost completely descended when Mana finally appeared, his household members standing some distance behind. Jerry’s first observation of the man was that he stood very still; the second, that he carried a blowgun. Hand-loomed cloth was wrapped around his waist, feathers hung from his ear lobes, and a headdress of red parrot feathers crowned hair that was long, black, and cut into bangs across his eyes.
“We are invited inside,” Luis finally said to Dr. Miller. “You will be able to make your requests there.”
As they sat in a circle around the fire pit, darkness fully on them, the jungle awoke in a cacophony of insect, bird, and primate sounds. Jerry moved closer to the fire, as much for the sense of protection as for warmth, and studied the group. A woman sat in the shadows feeding two of the younger children, one at each breast. At a separate fire, its smoke drifting toward the ceiling, another woman wrapped meat in banana leaves and placed the square bundles into a pot for steaming. A young girl, a teenager, held a child on her hip and watched the men’s group with avid curiosity. Jerry was already cataloguing objects of material culture—pots, and wooden plates, stirring utensils and machetes, sleeping pallets of wood and palm-leaf mattresses, a loom, wooden benches, and simple tables made from sections of logs.
“Does Mana agree to accept our visit for five weeks?” Dr. Miller asked Luis, who sat waiting to translate. “We have brought our own tents.”
Mana’s brow creased, and he spoke rapidly.
“He says,” Luis interpreted, “that he welcomes you, but you must share the men’s part of the house. If you slept outside, his enemies might take this time to seek revenge. An enemy shaman could fling poisonous objects into your body, causing illness and perhaps death.”
Soon, family members arrived from the second home, carrying bananas and papaya and a meat stew spiced with tomatoes, onions, and squash. Curious, they unabashedly studied the gifts Dr. Miller had brought. An elder daughter brought cups of strong beer made from sweet manioc roots, cooked, masticated, and spit back into a large pot to ferment with the help of the enzymes in the women’s spittle. Mana’s eldest wife served the roasted plantains and monkey meat she’d wrapped in the fresh banana leaves. Each time his drinking gourd was emptied, Jerry found it refilled, and soon, without warning, he knew he was smashed. Truly drunk, and famished, he ate ravenously.
Nearby, one of the older boys picked up a flute. A drum rhythm began. The women, wearing snail shell dance belts, began to sing, shells clicking as they moved in time to the drumbeat. Not often were there guests, and never white guests with their strange clothing and habits.
Luis removed his shirt so that his chest was as bare as those of Mana and his kinsmen, and he joined the dancing, standing close to Mana’s young wife, flirting outrageously, clearly as drunk as Jerry.
Suddenly, the younger daughter held out a hand, shaking her hips toward Jerry, and he jumped up, laughing loudly, and joined in the dancing. Just as he had in Africa with the Bwiti tribe’s people, he turned to the beat of his own internal rhythm. And even inebriated, he could see Mana watching him closely, surprised and smiling.
By midnight, the university party, exhausted from the long trek and the late hour, fell asleep on the bare ground. But Mana and his family spoke long into the night, close to the fires that protected them from things that moved in the darkness and the evening’s chill.
Slowly Jerry, Barry, and Dr. Miller began to learn the ways of this new world. After two weeks of studying subsistence, Dr. Miller thought they had enough of a foothold on the culture to begin to understand its finer points: the relevance of music, poetry, and songs—and the plants of the mind, those that altered consciousness.
“The German monograph we read is true,” Barry told them one evening as they sat around a fire pit discussing the day’s events. “What they perceive in—what shall we call it—‘ordinary reality’?—is considered a falsehood. What constitutes ‘reality’ is what is perceived while in the altered state of consciousness. I can only imagine that there’s a separate geography of the mind in these altered states. New patterns. Visual color, certainly. But I think the experience of the vines must be something unique if dreams of flying are achieved, or if lost objects can be located through visions. I’m not sure how to describe it in my notes.”
Jerry nodded while looking through his own notebook, writing additional comments as Barry spoke. “And healing,” he added. “The vine is used to heal the sick. In fact, Mana has told me that from birth to death, hallucinogens are a part of life here. Even newborns are given a hallucinogen to help protect them against sickness. It’s hoped the child will see a protective spirit.”
Dr. Miller checked to see that the tape recorder was still running, using the precious life of the batteries only in these evening reviews. “What about the waterfalls? Important, yes?”
“The most important event in a boy’s life,” Barry explained. “He’s about six or seven when he makes the trip to a sacred waterfall. It’s there that he’s given the true hallucinogenic experience for the first time.”
Jerry looked up. “Dr. Miller, have you been able to isolate all the vines used in the ayahuasca?”
“I’ve collected those Mana pointed out. All are in the genus Banisteriopsis. From previous chemical analysis, we’ve already determined the hallucinogenic alkaloids. The main ingredient is dimethyltryptamine—DMT. I’ll turn over the new samples to the chemist to see what we come up with.”
“It’s the curing shaman who prepares the vines,” Barry added. “If someone’s sick, or if something of value is lost, the shaman drinks the potion to see what witchcraft is involved.”
&n
bsp; Dr. Miller turned off the tape recorder. “Better save the battery for the ceremony. Mana has offered to bring a curing shaman to meet us tomorrow afternoon. He’s going to prepare the ayahuasca.”
“Then I’ll stick right with him. I’ll take photographs.” Barry picked up the camera bag, carefully checking the amount of film remaining. “I want to know if there are other additions to the brew.”
“I was planning to drink with the shaman,” Dr. Miller told them. “I want to try to understand what we haven’t been able to gather from all these descriptions.”
Jerry remembered the iboga of Africa, the ceremony, his visions, his healing moments with his father.
“Then I’ll join you,” he said.
The next morning, Jerry woke and walked to one side of the house to urinate. Mana had refused to let anyone leave in the early morning, fearing that an enemy might be waiting. Peering through the palm stave bars, Jerry watched the rising mist, soft white wisps against the green canopy. The monkeys were loud, as they always were at sunrise, flitting through the trees and making a huge racket. He reached out, held to the bars, and was suddenly transported back to prison so quickly and so surprisingly that he gasped. Anxious, barely able to breathe, he turned away and crumpled to the ground, sitting with his head between his knees.
Taking deep breaths, he tried to put aside the images and emotions that haunted him—the shock of the huge men coming through his door, the humiliation of the body search, the despair of handcuffs tightening around his wrists, the deadly monotony of days in the prison, the terrible waste of time never to be retrieved, the destruction of his belief in the world.
Quietly, observed only by Mana, Jerry picked up a rifle and slipped from the compound, breathing hard and determined to be alone.
Sounds were everywhere about him. He listened carefully, separating them in his mind. A check on his bearings, aligning his compass, and he stepped off the path, striding through the undergrowth following the song of birds. As he moved, he was overcome by a desire to be like the men of the settlement: naked and free, moving through jungle and streams of sunlight and swimming in the rivers. In nature, he would be able to return to his youth, to his love of the living world, to begin again.
On impulse, he lay down the rifle, removed his clothes, and stood, lifting his arms, opening his chest. Suddenly, in that jungle place, he fell to his knees, remembering, reliving the dread and sorrow and humiliation of his arrest and incarceration. For the first time, he wept, sobs shaking his body, until, balanced on hands and knees, he vomited, realizing and releasing every painful image with each heave of his body.
“Myles! Myles! I can’t forgive you,” he cried as he gripped the ground. “God help me! I can’t forgive what you’ve stolen from me. Not just my time and my future, but my trust in the world. You were my friend. Damn you, damn you. You were my friend!”
A tinamou partridge shrieked nearby, startling him. Taking great sobbing breaths, he looked around and realized where he was. Slowly, he stood and wiped his face, both frightened and relieved by the breakdown. Yet he knew, as he stood nestled in the womb of the trees surrounding him, that something had changed.
It’s time to let go. I need to get on with my life. I can’t erase the past, but I can accept it.
And Myles?
Myles can be avoided.
The partridge cried again. Trembling, unsteady, he readied the rifle, and when the bird rose, the sound of the rifle echoed through the trees.
“Jerry!” Dr. Miller called from the edge of the clearing. “You’ve been gone a long while! We’ve been waiting. The shaman arrived after you left and we collected the vine. Are you still planning to drink the brew this evening?”
Suddenly, Mana appeared, stepping into the clearing, and Jerry knew without doubt that he hadn’t been alone in the jungle, but had been quietly followed, protected.
Dear God, he thought, Mana saw my breakdown.
“Why don’t we go to the waterfall for the ceremony?” Jerry suggested. “We might have a better idea why the waterfalls are so important, why they’re considered sacred.”
“I think it’s a good idea, too,” Dr. Miller nodded. “If you’re going to participate, Luis suggested we fast.”
Packing all the equipment and recording materials they would need, the men were ready to set off at midafternoon. Mana’s eldest wife filled drinking gourds with large quantities of beer and wrapped supplies of sweet potatoes, green plantains, and squash in banana leaves. When all was assembled, the men began the hike upstream, carrying the rifles, packs, and baskets, the shaman and Mana leading, moving easily, quietly, through the forest, Dr. Miller, Jerry, and Barry following, Luis taking the rear.
The jungle near the waterfall was higher in altitude, green, vine laden, and abounding with ferns. When they stood at last to see the roaring river cascading from the top of a cliff, the spray that bounced and moved against the rocks and the bottom of the valley hosted dozens of rainbows.
“It’s spectacular!” Barry shouted above the thunderous roar of the water.
Mana moved away from the falls, arranged a camp, and started a fire. The shaman set a pot to slowly simmer, adding pieces of vine to it. Barry made notes and asked questions about the process while Luis translated. As the light turned golden and then dimmed in the late afternoon, the forest began to darken. The first stars appeared. Jerry realized the shaman had chosen the time well. A full moon was just rising, large and round, visible through the swatch of jungle cut by the river. Tonight, there would be enough darkness for visions, enough illumination for movement.
In silver light and surrounded by the sounds of the forest, the shaman finally filled a large gourd with the brew that had been simmering and put it aside to cool. The liquid was still warm when he passed the gourd to Dr. Miller and Jerry, controlling how much they drank. He refilled the gourd and passed it to Mana, and finally, drank a large portion, himself.
Jerry leaned back, staring into the fire and waiting for the changes. The shaman picked up his drum and began to quietly chant. In the near distance, the sound of the waterfall was as constant as it had been in daylight. The fire crackled.
Then, the jungle’s night sounds began to fade—subtly at first. A hum started far away then grew louder, roaring in his ears, fading, returning again. The oscillations moved down his body, shaking him. Beneath, the earth shifted, changing his sense of space. The night was pierced by colored illusions.
Jerry crawled away from the fire on his hands and knees, grabbed the ground, and for the second time that day, vomited. In releasing his nausea, he released his spirit, and he soared upward, smoothly, moving above the green jungle. Someone called to him, and he descended, attracted by energy, pulled to it. A woman sat on the ground with the vine in her lap, cut in large sections. “Come with me,” she said. Wisdom filled her eyes. But he was afraid he might give up his spirit to her and never return. He pulled away, soaring again. In seconds, he was back in his body, staring into the fire.
The flames moved, formed, reformed. A snake appeared—black and gold, the markings of the anaconda.
Flee!
But his body could not move. The snake grew larger, moving from the flames, toward him, opening its mouth. Jerry drew back, staring into the open mouth ready to devour him.
“I am your fear,” the beast whispered. “I am your death. You will be my food. Life continues by eating the living.”
From above, a great flapping of wings sounded. Before he could respond, the bird had Jerry in its talons, clutching his shoulders, dragging his body away from the snake. Again, Jerry flew, gripped by the falcon, and then … he was the bird, flying, soaring, the jungle beneath him, following the line of the river, his eyes looking down on the dwellings of the compound, flying back to the waterfall, the earth a silver glow, his feet finally touching down on a path that led to the river.
The roar of the waterfall called, and he ran—sure-footed, the way clear, his body untouched by vine or leaf, moving s
wiftly, no longer separate from the jungle. Breaking out of the undergrowth, he stood in a clearing on a wide wet rock. The pounding water of the fall competed with his pounding heart. Where, in the afternoon, many small, bright rainbows had glistened in the mists of the downpour, now there was a great arc of moonlight entwined with smaller arcs. Spray fell in hundreds of tiny silver-white beads, touching the earth to shimmer where they lay.
Jerry saw the woman again. She wore a white woven gown tied at the waist with a rope the color of the moonbeam. “Come with me,” she said, moving toward the falls.
Jerry tore at his clothes. Naked, he picked his way along the rocks, moving closer to the ledge underneath the deafening falls. His hand touched water, soft, smooth, like silken fabric.
“Come,” he heard again. “I am what you seek. I am the future you desire. I am power over death. Only the future remains.” The feminine form shifted, became male, then female, then male again.
Jerry stepped onto the wet ledge, without care, his feet sliding along smooth rock. The pounding of the falls became a dim echo, his body as wet and smooth as the stones. The ledge widened. With one hand, he touched the figure’s outstretched fingers, turned his back against the wall, and ejaculated into the spray, his semen dazzling drops mixed among millions of drops, bounding away into the night, floating down river to the Amazon and the ocean beyond.
And then the image was gone.
From the forest, the shrill call of the falcon pierced the roar. How had he heard it? He followed the sound until he stood on the earth, lifted his voice in answer, a shrill whistle, then he was flying again, his arms outstretched, testing his wings, landing once again near the waterfall.
A Nation of Mystics Page 31
