The Masquerade

He jumps, engages in acrobatic featsDrunken by coded chants and drummingEnraptured beyond mortal realmHis ego tickled and heightenedGleefully he responds to each callAwed onlookers shudder and wonderAt this creature with a monstrous auraWith skin tainted and blackenedAnd palm fronds sprouting from his headHis mask, an insignia of his cadreWomen are warned not to have a peepLess they bear his form and lookChildren cower when they hear his nameNon Initiates flee the street in frightAs he approaches boldly and fearlesslyNeither a mortal nor a spiritA pseudo-human, an African mythA messenger from the land beyondAccoutered in sacred regaliaHis sight, a dread and a phobia