The Sickness of the Swamp

Without faith, not even the rain can wash sickness away.

The Mother of Rain sought out the diviners in heaven: not only did she want a child, but also she wanted a child of power; and not only did she want that child to be powerful, but also she wanted that child to have more power than anything on the earth. The diviners told her two things: make ebó and have faith. The Mother of Rain made ebó quickly, and she made it with faith in her heart; and she watched as her child’s storm clouds unrolled over a clear, blue sky. She smiled as the clouds thickened and darkened the firmament. Her son had more power than the sun; he blocked out all of heaven and the earth sighed.

Rain came gently at first, and then he became a storm. Everything hid while sheets of water sliced the air. When the skies cleared and the sun bore down, it was humid and sticky. Creatures walked slowly on the earth’s face, miserable in the clammy air. All the water that could ran to the river and the sea, but some was trapped in the moist earth where it became muddy and gooey; and as the water stood still, it stagnated. The swamp was born.

As those waters grew fetid, the swamp was sick. The Spirit of the Swamp went to the diviners to make ebó.

“If you want your health back,” the diviners told him, “you must make ebó. More importantly you must have faith. For ebó without faith is as futile as not making ebó at all.”

In spite of the decay and decomposition developing in his own body, the swamp found the strength to make ebó; but he did it with hopelessness in his heart and not faith. To the orishas he gave roosters and hens and all types of four-legged animals, and he served his own head with the same. When he was done he sank back into his fetid waters and waited for death to come.

Instead of death the rain came again; and when the sky cleared, his swamp was more putrid than before.

He sighed a deep sigh as he resigned himself to a life of suffrage: because he made ebó, he was immortal on the earth, but because he had no faith his sickness remained. And this is why even today the swamps are filled with disease and decay while the waters of the world remain fresh; and over all these the Rain has power because his Mother in heaven made ebó for him.