A service to Grand Bwa is a happy, lively event! Grand Bwa himself is a happy, positive, energetic lwa. He is the sprouting, shooting, flourishing forest; the living spirit of the woods.

We find this image in European culture as well - the Green Man of centuries past, or for a more modern example, in the film "Babes in Toyland", the remarkable "Forest of No Return", where the trees not only walked and talked but sang! Those trees were scary, but Grand Bwa in his right frame of mind is as beneficent as the summer woodlands, as restorative to the soul as wild blackberries, as friendly as a hillside pool in a rocky stream.

To make Grand Bwa's altar, start with a red altar cloth, because Grand Bwa is a Petro lwa. Then add drapes of green, using Vodouisant "mouchoirs" if you have them, or lengths of green satiny cloth if you don't. Pin Grand Bwa's vever (available in the Grand Bwa Instructional Package) to the front of your altar, or attach it to the wall behind your altar.

Go out into the woods, and bring in leaves. Lots of leaves! Break little branches, bring in armloads! Surround your altar with leaves and twigs. Bring flowers from the fields. Do whatever you can to bring Grand Bwa indoors.

Grand Bwa drinks an herbal infusion in kleren, single distilled rum. You can approximate Grand Bwa's drink by putting star anise into a bottle of white rum, with a little sugar. But if you can not buy or keep alcohol, give Grand Bwa other things - a straw bag called a djakout, a machete, a large piece of wood, a log really, from the woods, that you can stand up against the wall like a post (a 'big wood' is 'Grand Bwa').

If you do herbal magic, bring out your herbs! Put samples of all the herbs you use and all the things you make on the altar. If you have woodland artifacts, feathers found in the woods, antlers, things like that, then you can put them on the altar too.

Grand Bwa's true food is a black male pig of a certain type. On the principle that wild goats live in the woods, he will also take a goat, and I am willing to bet that here in Massachusetts if I could catch a deer during hunting season, Grand Bwa would love it! But here in the USA it's difficult to make sacrifice. Thankfully, you can ask Haitian Vodouisants to assist you and enable you to present Grand Bwa with his true sacrifice, by using the wep page on sacrifice and ceremony. This page links you with Haitian members of the Roots Without End Society, who will perform the required ritual for you, in your name. By doing this, you greatly empower your work! Your magic is much stronger, your interaction with the lwa more evident and effective.


Remember, Grand Bwa is everywhere, not just in Haiti! He is every forest in the world. If you can not offer Grand Bwa a pig, or a goat, or even a vegetarian food offering, you can still feed Grand Bwa right in your home! Give him a wooden or calabash bowl full of sweet potato, yam, boiled green banana, militon (called "choyote" in Spanish groceries), and rice and red beans. If you can present woodland foods from your area, wild berries, acorns, then do so. The more you can give Grand Bwa, the more he has to work with, and the more he can multiply the benefits back to you.

If you are going to take Grand Bwa's herbal bath, available in the Grand Bwa Instructional Package, do so before you begin your service. Dress yourself in green, with a red kerchief. Present yourself before the altar nice and clean and smelling good.

Light a white candle, and begin your invocation with the Lord's Prayer, or some other prayer to the One Most High God. If you know Vodou ceremonial service complete the opening portion, and invoke Legba. If you don't know how to do this, simply say,

"Papa Legba open the gate for me!
Atibon Legba open the gate for me!
Open the gate for me, Papa, and let me pass,
When I return, I will thank the lwa!"


Throw a little water three times on the ground. Light a green candle for Grand Bwa. Sing for him if you know his songs, if not, sing songs about the woods, the forest. Keep it very positive, dance in happy movements! Open the windows of your house and let in the fresh air! Call Grand Bwa as you dance, say, "Grand Bwa, Big Woods, come to my house! Come with your energy, come and cleanse and renew everything here!" Do what you can do, if you can sing, sing; if you can drum, drum; if you can dance, dance!

Put a candle in the middle of Grand Bwa's bowl of food, and light it. Say, "Grand Bwa, this is for you, I, (say your name), am presenting it to you! I am happy you are here with me! Grand Bwa, Big Woods! I feed you. Help me, Papa Grand Bwa!", and so on in the same vein. If you are offering sacrifice in Haiti, either of a pig or of a goat, tell Grand Bwa so! The hungry people who have been fed by your sacrifice will bless you, and the lwa Grand Bwa, fed by the life energy of your offering, will likewise bless and empower you.

After you have given Grand Bwa his food, stand up in front of the altar and talk to him! Tell him what you want. Remind him that you are the one feeding him, "Do you see anyone else around here feeding you, Grand Bwa?"

This is the time to perform prosperity magic! Grand Bwa loves to shower people with vigor and increase! Turn this energy to your economic advantage. In Haiti we use leaf powders and fresh leaves, and we do all kinds of things. In our house, the Roots Without End Society, we have an associate medsen fey, or Vodou herbalist, named Loulou Prince. He has provided Prosperity Leaf Powder, made from leaves harvested ceremonially in the Haitian countryside, dried, and pounded in a consecrated mortar in the Roots Without End Society peristyle. The Prosperity Leaf Powder Package is available on the same page as the Grand Bwa Instructional Package.

If you use other leaves to do magic, or if you drink particular herbal teas, now is a good time. If you want to do divination, read the cards, or whatever method you use, this is also a good time. Then close your ceremony, say, "Grand Bwa, thank you in advance for all that you are going to do for me! Papa Legba, I thank you! Honor and respect to the lwa." Put out your white candle and Grand Bwa's green candle.

Leave the candle burning in the middle of the food offering until it goes out. Do not leave your home with an unattended candle burning! When the candle is finished, let the food remain on the altar overnight. Then take the food, still in the wooden or calabash bowl, and cover it in a bag, and go to the woods. Hide the food offering in a thicket or under a bush somewhere that other people will not find it.

Say, "Grand Bwa, here is your food." Then ask for what you want.

Go home, and be happy that you have been blessed, refreshed, invigorated and empowered by Grand Bwa!

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