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The Story of Le Petit Mouse Brigitte

On Halloween 2011 I did a Vodoun Ghede and Maman Brigitte Fete in

my temple to honour and avert Death. It was a very powerful ritual. I

used white chalk and drew the veves for the Petro Legba, Ghede,

Maman Brigitte, and Exu with Pomba Gira on pieces of slate that looked

like grave markers. I slipped into some spontaneous drum rhythms I

have never heard nor done before. The ritual was very powerful and I

asked Les Loa de la Morte to avert my death.

Steles with Veves

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The next morning my Spider Cat had cornered then captured a little

grey brown mousie who had somehow gotten into the house. Try as I

did to chase her away from the mouse, she got it and carried it to the

cellar, giving the hard bite, then finally dropped the mouse on the floor

where it was taking its last breaths. So I picked the poor critter up

and placed it in a container on a paper towel. Amazingly it came back to

life somewhat, but its back was obviously broken and it was paralyzed

from the waist down. It also had big puncture wounds to the chest and

abdomen. I only expected it to live a few minutes. But it lived on. I

place it over a group of crystals in the sunlight. Then later that eve I

made a softer bed of toilet paper and put it on the gas stove near the

pilot light for heat. It obviously had collapsed lungs and had the signs

of pulmonary edema with the pink blood coming out of its nose. But it

would look up at me and I would pet it and it would shut its eyes like

this made it feel good. I decided it was a she and named her Brigitte

after the Loa I had evoked the night before.

This continued on for two days, her hanging on to life, reviving and

dragging herself around, looking up at me, being petted, feeling warm

and snuggly in the toilet paper, which i changed every few hours. I

thought I may have to start a mouse nursing home wing for a paraplegic

mouse at one point. LOL.

Then two days later I went to the Hex House and did the final 5th part

of a long ritual I had been doing. Before I left Le Petit Mouse Brigitte

was fine, though she was lethargic in the am. But when I got back she

had passed on in comfort. I cried and cried for that little mouse, sorry

my cat had killed her, thought that is the nature of cats. I also felt

that working with those Loa maybe they took a sacrifice, and she

offered herself as a scapegoat to take away my death by offering her

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life. I know this sounds silly, but this is the magickal thinking I have on

my path. One has to be very careful with the Loa. They are very playful

and tricky at times. Do not ask for what you do not want, and make it

very clear what methods you permit them to use. That is the lesson I

learned from this.

A friend said I am a good priest, and so I am a priest to the critters

too. I capture and release spiders and insects and other critters that

get into the house. That is just my nature as a Buddhist and as a Witch

priest.

So I put her little body into a little cardboard box with oak leaves and

corn on the bottom, laid her in wrapped in tissue, poured bird seed and

even sugar over her and took her out to bury in the red loam of the

newly fallen 250 year old Bear Oak tree across the stream. On the way

I picked up a flat stone I had found with quartz crystals on its edge,

and that covered the box. I hand dug a hole and put her into the loam

and covered her with the burial stone then covered that with a big

piece of the red oak cork wood then put some green plants on top of

her.

May she be reborn far away from people and houses and cats and live a

long and productive life next time. Thank you little Brigitte for giving

me the joy of nursing you the best I can. Thank you Papa Ghede and

Maman Brigitte for working to avert my death. I am blessed.

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Burial box with crystal edged stone lid

Burial under red oak cork at base of fallen Bear Oak tree

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Final offering of green plant for rebirth

©2011 G Lee Hoke

Footnote – feedback from JJ –

… Especially the one concerning the mouse. Thank you for sharing that !

It reminds me of an antidote of Sybil’s in one of her books where she

recounts how as a child she became very ill and nothing anyone could do

was helping and she became progressively weaker and weaker until her

Grandmother came into her room late one night and asked her if she

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truly wanted to live and that sometimes for something to be given

something must be paid in return and the next morning when she woke

up she was feeling better and by the next day almost recovered but

when she asked about her pet bird that was always in her room she was

told it had passed away the night before. I don’t know a lot about the

Lwa but what I do know makes it seem possible that the energy , or

ashe of the mouse’s passing may have been tied to their intervention

somehow as they deal with the deeper and more visceral powers of life

and death. I imagine the mouse’s death would have come about in any

event but the Loa may have made use of the already existing situation (

the cats act of being true to it’s nature ) to fuel the ritual or perhaps

to “test” you , the way you cared for the mouse and showed a

compassion that most would not have would have I would say mean that

you “passed” and in the tradition of Voudoun and Santeria the spirit of

the animal that assists in such a ritual ( being shown honor by the

priest or priestess performing the rite ) is blessed by the Loa. I

believe that an act of true kindness can mean more to the Gods than

the most elaborate rituals and there does seem to be a thread tying

everything together. . . . .