THE TAINO CHRONICLES
These are the ancient legends and teachings of the Taino peoples as they were interpreted to the boitius and beikes of the Caney Spiritual Circle through the inspiration of the hupias (spirits of the ancestors) and the semis (the spirits of Nature).
FIRST VERSE
Ata Bei, also known as the Cosmic Matriarch, Mother of all. She is the source of all, and the conclusion of all. She defines prime matter and all that is tangible, and she manifests the cosmic cycles. She is the soul of the Cosmic Serpent. The shape of her sacred womb is reflected in the shape of the stone oval hoop. Her spirit is instilled in the coa, the mystic agricultural digging stick that is the tool by which the people provide for their livelihood.
Ata Bei causes her belly to swell, wills herself pregnant, and she bears the fatherless twin brothers. Ata Bei’s children are born simultaneously. They are the cosmic children of the cosmic womb.
SECOND VERSE
Ioka Hu Bagua Ma-Orokoti (Yokahu) is the first born, and yet he has no beginning. He is eternal and continuously cyclical. And that is the mystery of his existence for he is born of the Mother yet he has no beginning or end. He has endless life-cycles. He has endless births and endless deaths.
Ioka Hu is the Life Force of the Universe. His essence is evident in the magnificence of heaven, which is called “Turei” and he is talked of as living there.
Ioka Hu joins Ata Bei his mother and their union creates the sacred balanced unity called “Iaia-GuaTurei” (Yaya) (the GREAT SPIRIT).
THIRD VERSE
Guakar (Oa-Kar) is the second born, constant companion of humanity. He is human challenge. He is all painful experience from which humans can learn. He was even born in pain for he causes the Cosmic Mother great suffering as he is born and his name means “Our Harsh Menstrual Cramps”. Guakar brings forth the gifts of trials, tribulations and the agony of the human state. He is the hard lessons that we each have to learn in order to be true to the human condition. He is ever watchful to maintain us on the right path. Because Guakar represents a manifestation of the monthly cycles he is actually a flip-side manifestation of the moon spirit. As the female moon spirit manifestation, Karaya, is the epitome of creative fertility, so the male moon spirit Guakar represents the opposite, a manifestation of challenge and infertility, imbalance, illness, a “bad moon”.
FOURTH VERSE
Ata Bei spoke to her son Ioka Hu (Yokahu) and commanded him thus: “I hereby give birth to the sacred cycles and you are co-author.”
Their joint cycles produce the great wonders that illuminate the skies. Through the power of his cycle Ioka Hu (Yokahu) unites in coitus with At Bei and she conceives. Then upon her command he reaches into her sacred womb through the cave Iguanaboina. He withdraws his hand and brings forth Guey, our radiant sun, upon which our planet’s life depends for its existence.
Ioka Hu reaches into the womb of Ata Bei a second time and brings forth Kararia (Karaya) , the silvery reflector of Guey’s light, who measures each month the sacred fertility cycle of Ata Bei’s womb. Karaia is the sacred moon.
And the holy cave through which the great lights were born became manifest on Earth so that humans may have a reference point. And the sacred cave, the opening into the womb of the Great Mother, is called Iguanaboina.
FIFTH VERSE
Ioka Hu reaches again into Ata Bei’s womb and withdraws his hand holding four stones. These four stones are stars and he places them in the four sacred directions of the sky. The first he names ACHIANO and he places it in the SOUTH. The second one he names KOROMO and he places it in the WEST. The third one he names RAKUNO and he places it in the NORTH. The fourth one he names SOBAIKO and he places it in the EAST. They are now millions for the “four” is the symbol number for eternity. They are the stars that we now see in the Turei (Turey) (heaven).
Then Ioka Hu reaches into his mother’s womb again and brings forth three stones. He places these at the center of the Turei and establishes the triangle of the primordial hearth (Con tres piedras hizo el fogon). And from the Primordial hearth rises the smoke of the FIRST FIRE. The smoke rises ever higher and solidifies into the trunk of a mystical tree, with its roots at the bottom of the primordial sea and the upper branches in the Turei (sky). This is the sacred ceiba tree, the mother of all trees. The tree that stands at the center of Creation. Iokahu stirs the fermenting mists of the heavens and by doing so he forms and shapes all of the heavenly bodies.
