THE CONGO THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE

BLACK,
BY VACHEL LINDSAY
CUTTING THROUGH THE FOREST WITH A GOLDEN
TRACK.
Fat black bucks in a wine-barrel room,
A negro fairyland swung into view,
Barrel-house kings, with feet unstable,
A minstrel river
Sagged and reeled and pounded on the table,
Where dreams come true.
Pounded on the table,
The ebony palace soared on high
Beat an empty barrel with the handle of a broom,
Through the blossoming trees to the evening sky.
Hard as they were able,
The inlaid porches and casements shone
Boom, boom, BOOM,
With gold and ivory and elephant-bone.
With a silk umbrella and the handle of a broom,
And the black crowd laughed till their sides were sore
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM.
At the baboon butler in the agate door,
THEN I had religion, THEN I had a vision.
And the well-known tunes of the parrot band
I could not turn from their revel in derision.
That trilled on the bushes of that magic land.
THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE
BLACK,
A troupe of skull-faced witch-men came
CUTTING THROUGH THE FOREST WITH A GOLDEN
Through the agate doorway in suits of flame,
TRACK.
Yea, long-tailed coats with a gold-leaf crust
Then along that riverbank
And hats that were covered with diamond-dust.
A thousand miles
And the crowd in the court gave a whoop and a call
Tattooed cannibals danced in files;
And danced the juba from wall to wall.
Then I heard the boom of the blood-lust song
But the witch-men suddenly stilled the throng
And a thigh-bone beating on a tin-pan gong.
With a stern cold glare, and a stern old song: —
And “BLOOD” screamed the whistles and the fifes of the
“Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you.” ...
warriors,
Just then from the doorway, as fat as shotes,
“BLOOD” screamed the skull-faced, lean witch-doctors,
Came the cake-walk princes in their long red coats,
“Whirl ye the deadly voo-doo rattle,
Canes with a brilliant lacquer shine,
Harry the uplands,
And tall silk hats that were red as wine.
Steal all the cattle,
And they pranced with their butterfly partners there,
Rattle-rattle, rattle-rattle,
Coal-black maidens with pearls in their hair,
Bing.
Knee-skirts trimmed with the jassamine sweet,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM,”
And bells on their ankles and little black-feet.
A roaring, epic, rag-time tune
And the couples railed at the chant and the frown
From the mouth of the Congo
Of the witch-men lean, and laughed them down.
To the Mountains of the Moon.
(O rare was the revel, and well worth while
Death is an Elephant,
That made those glowering witch-men smile.)
Torch-eyed and horrible,
Foam-flanked and terrible.
The cake-walk royalty then began
BOOM, steal the pygmies,
To walk for a cake that was tall as a man
BOOM, kill the Arabs,
To the tune of “Boomlay, boomlay, BOOM,”
BOOM, kill the white men,
While the witch-men laughed, with a sinister air,
HOO, HOO, HOO.
And sang with the scalawags prancing there: —
Listen to the yell of Leopold’s ghost
“Walk with care, walk with care,
Burning in Hell for his hand-maimed host.
Or Mumbo-Jumbo, God of the Congo,
Hear how the demons chuckle and yell
And all the other
Cutting his hands off, down in Hell.
Gods of the Congo,
Listen to the creepy proclamation,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you.
Blown through the lairs of the forest-nation,
Beware, beware, walk with care,
Blown past the white-ants’ hill of clay,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, boom.
Blown past the marsh where the butterflies play: —
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, boom.
“Be careful what you do,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, boom.
Or Mumbo-Jumbo, God of the Congo,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay,
And all of the other
BOOM.”
Gods of the Congo,
Oh rare was the revel, and well worth while
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
That made those glowering witch-men smile.
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you.”

Wild crap-shooters with a whoop and a call

Danced the juba in their gambling-hall
And laughed fit to kill, and shook the town,
And guyed the policemen and laughed them down
With a boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM.