HS, It Works!
Basically I want to test this batch of plain dry leaf from
the Salvia Buyers Club. The leaves have an agreeable mint smell. I plan to make
a small quid, but there’s just too much noise at home, so I take a walk
outside. My pipe, packed with two Sally leaves, and torch lighter, keep me
company in the dark.
I’m nervous. I’ve never smoked Salvia before—much less,
without a sitter.
I recline on a chair in the patio. Well, this is it. But somehow, the
time doesn’t seem right. I get up and walk a couple of more rounds to shake off
the unease.
Ten minutes later, I fire up my pipe bowl. Here goes…. First toke: the pleasant
taste and aroma surprise me. It’s almost like cannabis, but much more mellow.
Holding the smoke in my lungs for the customary thirty seconds, it suddenly
crosses my mind that perhaps my supplier accidentally packed his personal pot supply
in my package.
Second toke: no,
it doesn’t feel like pot. The neighbor’s house is starting to look very
strange, as if it were undulating…. I remember to take the requisite third
toke. By this time, most of the leaves are burned, and the smoke scalds my
throat. I drop the pipe on the ground.
For a moment, there’s pain and heat, then suddenly, an
overwhelming numbness. I’m slowly “folded” up and into the
body of a gigantic fly. I can “see” that I’m destined to
become one of the “scales” in the thorax of this fearsome but strangely
magnificent creature. As I’m being “fused”, a wave of uncontrollable laughter
seizes me. Holy shit, I shout,
it works! This isn’t pot!
The metamorphic vision couldn’t have lasted more than a minute.
After this, the trip is virtually over. The last and only other vision was that
of some great art work—Klee- or
Picasso-like—imprinted on a tall wooden fence.
Then I remember that a few hours ago, I watched my wife
swat a large fly on our living room armchair. Everyone had been grossed out,
and she had to use a lot of soap and water to clean the mess. The words of the
18th century visionary poet William Blake come to mind:
Little fly,
Thy summer's play
My thoughtless hand
Has brushed away.
Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?
For I dance,
And drink, and sing,
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing.
Although I still prefer chewing a quid, my first Salvia smoke is
an eerie and wonderful experience.