Cabeça de Exu

Cabeça de Exu

Tainã Rosa
The University of Texas at Austin

The path to Exu’s house was empty; no one could cross that ground without an invitation from the entity leading the ritual. I could see this terrain through the glass. As a researcher and a Black woman with a Black religious ancestry, I sometimes struggle to find my position in certain circumstances. Many times during the investigation of Alvorecer em Terreiros, I asked gods and deities to allow me to work. I told them that I would let my individual journey happen at the right moment. However, on this night, I wasn’t working—and the Exus knew it.

From the beginning to the middle of the ritual, many entities invited me to drink or dance with them. I politely declined these invitations, but I wasn’t the only one making this decision. They were staring at me with playful smiles, giving me the sense that they were hiding something they knew I didn’t know. From the middle to the end of the party, a smoky dimension invaded my eyes, and I started to feel everyone around me—whether they were happy or sad, whether they needed help, or whether they were thinking about me or about the entity that was thinking with me at that point. I tried to appear calm and entered the glass room to get some water. I passed by some religious leaders I already knew and caught the attention of Mãe Janaína. She looked at me with a furrowed brow and asked, “Are you okay?” I shook my head, saying no. I felt nervous and ashamed that I couldn’t control myself or what was happening to my mind and body—and tears began to run down my face.

Mãe Janaína and I knew each other from the research in Alvorecer em Terreiros. She is a Black woman with dark brown skin and deep, furious black eyes, like a tiger. She has strong arms and was wearing white, as expected from her tradition. She was there only to observe—she couldn’t participate in the ritual because she practices Batuque and Umbanda, not Quimbanda. Mãe Janaína asked someone for a chair, sat me down in the front yard, and I threw up on the floor. I could see in her eyes that she knew exactly what was happening to me. She called for Exu. Her firm touch on my arm and her calm voice gave the sense that she wasn’t worried about my spiritual journey, but about how I was feeling in that moment. She didn’t want me to feel bad about it, so she supported me through every step. I couldn’t open my eyes, but I could hear/feel, simultaneously, a mix of voices around me: Mãe Janaína, a Pombagira, and a Cigano. I was in total darkness, and I cried, sobbing. At the same time, I knew that another part of me didn’t want to cry. This other part wanted to help the people around me, but I didn’t have the strength or the knowledge to do it.

Exu arrived and hugged me. I felt his body in an intense warmth—skin on skin. I’m not sure which part of his body I was touching. He stood me up, but I couldn’t open my eyes or feel my legs. He was holding me up with his arms. He said something in Yoruba into my right ear. I didn’t know the words, but I understood their meaning at that moment—though I couldn’t recall it afterward—and then my right arm dropped. He did the same on the other side, and I fell. Then he stood me up again and helped me walk. At this point, I couldn’t feel anything in my body or see where I was going. A few steps later, my body reacted and I opened my eyes for one second. I saw Exu’s house. It was a small room with Exu statues, skulls, tridents, cachaça bottles, red candles, Cuban cigars, and smoke. I was afraid of what was going to happen, but I couldn’t stop walking. I spun around at the door of Exu’s house, my eyes rolled back, and I finished the spin with my back to the small house. Exu yelled—for me and for those who were accompanying me through my body—: “Enough!” and everything stopped. I opened my eyes, and I was alone. I felt dizzy and confused. I was ashamed once more, but now I was ashamed of having felt ashamed the first time. As a researcher I had already seen people crossing between earthly and spiritual dimensions before. This wasn’t new for me. Everyone around me smiled and asked how I was feeling. They didn’t seem confused at all about what had happened. They told me to sit and rest. Exu asked me to speak with him again, alone, on another day.

Later, I thought about this experience over and over. My take on it is that the gods and deities decided to show me their power through an embodied experience, so I could better understand the people around me and what truly happens in Black Houses of Worship in my city. They gave me a chance to improve my work and to begin my own journey at the right time, just as I had asked them.