The Three Halves Of Ino Moxo: Teachings of the Wizard of the Upper Amazon

What a strange poetic work this is. Translated from Spanish by Kenneth Symington and first published in English in 1995, it is the apparently oral account of Cesar Calvo of his life in the forests and towns of the Peruvian Amazon. Both ayahuasca and a magical world view permeate the story, creating an engrossing magical realism:

"The dose of ayawaskha that the sorcerer gave me last night has not yet returned to the air; it persists in my blood even though dawn is so white as to almost be indigo blue. In the adjacent huts begin rustles, fryings, body washings, rumors of breakfast. At our back the Amazon passes on, deafening and illuminating the sky. I hear an airplane, raise my face. I see it descend and shrink,turn into a that colorful macaw, a wacamayu, and perch with scintillating plumage in the branches of an apasharama tree. I don't know why I remember what I have never known."

Here is a world view intimately informed by psychedelics and expressed with an eloquence that captures the beauty and sense of mystery that the psychedelic experience offers. Ken Symington's translation is skillfull and reads well; this book shouldn't be missed by anyone curious about ayahuasca.