Hadriana in All My Dreams

by René Depestre

THE ZOMBIFIER’S SECRET CODE, OR A ZOMBIFEROUS PHARMACOPOEIA The first stage of the zombification process is the dramatic slowing-down of the metabolism. The houngan—the Vodou priest—who creates the zombie arranges things with an accomplice, usually a member of the victim’s entourage, who administers the precise dose of a highly toxic substance to the target. The formula for the most well-known zombie poison requires the following ingredients: extracts of dried sea toad, a mule’s gallbladder, tibial scrapings from a rabid dog, ground-up bones of a young boy, puffer flesh cartilage, and bones from the middle ear of a garter snake. These ingredients are all ground together in a mortar or using a grindstone, along with a few tcha-tcha seeds, some velvet bean sap, a bit of powdered sulphur, and a few mothballs. That mix is then blended into a solution consisting of rum, castor oil, and asafoetida. Ingesting the drug leads to the apparent cessation of the principle vital functions, which bottom out at about zero, at the point of no return where decomposition otherwise sets in. In the hours following the burial of the zombified body, the witch doctor initiates the reanimation of the bogus cadaver. In order to do this, he gives the victim an antidote composed of zombie-cucumber (devil’s trumpet or jimsonweed) and dried leaves from several trees (including cupiuba, pleomele, and guaiacum). These elements are then diluted in a large calabash shell full of seawater that has served pr...