The Old Woman

She lives alone at the end of the village road, seldom seen, her house always closed up as she sleeps away the day.
As evening draws near, she stirs and sheds her old and wrinkled skin, which she deposits into a mortar that she hides carefully away.

Now, as a glowing ball of flame, she rises up through the roof and with a shrill cry that sets the village dogs to howling, she flies through the night in search of a victim and she would suck his ‘life-blood’ from him clean.
But she has to slip back into her skin before dawn breaks or the cock crows, so she hurries through the forest for her home, finds the mortar with her wretched skin and proceeds to put it on, - but something’s wrong, it burns like fire, it seems to shrink and slide away, “skin, kin, kin, you na no me, you na no me”, she sings, crooning softly, pleading to the wrinkled, dreadful thing. “You na no me, old skin.” Then, with horror, she realizes the dreadful thing that has been done: The village boys and men have filled her skin with coarse salt and pepper and will soon come and get her, with a drum of boiling tar, the priest and his silver cross, the church bells - and then, the end.
If you wish to discover who the Soucouyant in your village is empty 100 lbs of rice at the village crossroads where she will be compelled to pick them up, one grain at a time - that is how you’ll know the Soucouyant.