from The Congo: Section 1
By Vachel Lindsay
I. THEIR BASIC SAVAGERY
Fat black bucks in a wine-barrel room,
Barrel-house kings, with feet unstable,
Sagged and reeled and pounded on the table,
Pounded on the table,
Beat an empty barrel with the handle of a broom,
Hard as they were able,
Boom, boom, BOOM,
With a silk umbrella and the handle of a broom,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM.
THEN I had religion, THEN I had a vision.
I could not turn from their revel in derision.
THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE BLACK,
CUTTING THROUGH THE FOREST WITH A GOLDEN TRACK.
Then along that riverbank
A thousand miles
Tattooed cannibals danced in files;
Then I heard the boom of the blood-lust song
And a thigh-bone beating on a tin-pan gong.
And “BLOOD” screamed the whistles and the fifes of the warriors,
“BLOOD” screamed the skull-faced, lean witch-doctors,
“Whirl ye the deadly voo-doo rattle,
Harry the uplands,
Steal all the cattle,
Rattle-rattle, rattle-rattle,
Bing.
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM,”
A roaring, epic, rag-time tune
From the mouth of the Congo
To the Mountains of the Moon.
Death is an Elephant,
Torch-eyed and horrible,
Foam-flanked and terrible.
BOOM, steal the pygmies,
BOOM, kill the Arabs,
BOOM, kill the white men,
HOO, HOO, HOO.
Listen to the yell of Leopold’s ghost
Burning in Hell for his hand-maimed host.
Hear how the demons chuckle and yell
Cutting his hands off, down in Hell.
Listen to the creepy proclamation,
Blown through the lairs of the forest-nation,
Blown past the white-ants’ hill of clay,
Blown past the marsh where the butterflies play: —
“Be careful what you do,
Or Mumbo-Jumbo, God of the Congo,
And all of the other
Gods of the Congo,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you.”
A sport made for spectating if there ever was one!
Stunning!
TerryMay 21, 2019, 2:34 PM
I ran track in HS and into college (developed serious tendonitis in both shins). If there were distractions as shown in this video, I would have been ejected from the team due to not completing the workouts. I really enjoy watching athletic women in action. Those shorts——WOW! No fat girls either!!! Difficult to vault if fat.
That Charles, always HAS to drag politics into it.
Some people….
PA CatMay 21, 2019, 8:42 PM
When I want to see cute rear ends, I watch baseball. Most of you guys don’t come close to being worth watching.
ChrisMay 21, 2019, 8:57 PM
This figures that it was Brasil. I had the good fortune to spend 6 months working in Brasil… in an office that was adjacent to a college. It was as close to paradise as a man could get. Unfortunately, I was already married, otherwise, I would have never come back to the US.
“Italy Woman’s Pole Vault”. Italian Athletics maybe on BrazilianTVHD?
JackMay 23, 2019, 9:42 AM
I remember that poem on The Congo when I was a school kid in the deep South, years before forced integration. I think I first heard it in the 2nd or 3rd grade and it is just as true today as it was then but so few today realize it exists and understands the topic. And what’s astonishing is that the black is far more prevalent and violent than he’s ever been in history and he’s growing worse.
A pretty young woman’s butt, like that pictured, is a thing of true and stunning beauty. Doesn’t matter quite so much when we’re banging on the door of 70 with a big hammer but my memory hasn’t faded and I still appreciate them and I do remember that I had a fine time with ’em when I was younger.
CallmelennieMay 23, 2019, 12:20 PM
I’ll take a stab at the one liner, JWM (actually a two liner)
Why is women’s weightlifting in the Olympics but not men’s powerlifting ? After all, hundreds of millions of men have done a bench press; how many people have ever done a woman’s snatc- (Don’t answer that!)
Well, whatever that number is, it’s probably equal to the the number who have done the woman’s pole vault
After scanning its face again and again,
I began to scale it, picking my holds
With intense caution. About half-way
To the top, I was suddenly brought to
A dead stop, with arms outspread
Clinging close to the face of the rock
Unable to move hand or foot
Either up or down. My doom
Appeared fixed. I MUST fall.
There would be a moment of
Bewilderment, and then,
A lifeless rumble down the cliff
To the glacier below.
My mind seemed to fill with a
Stifling smoke. This terrible eclipse
Lasted only a moment, when life blazed
Forth again with preternatural clearness.
I seemed suddenly to become possessed
Of a new sense. My trembling muscles
Became firm again, every rift and flaw in
The rock was seen as through a microscope,
My limbs moved with a positiveness and precision
With which I seemed to have
Nothing at all to do.
Real World Address for Donations, Mash Notes and Hate Mail
Gerard Van der Leun
1692 MANGROVE AVE
APT 379
Chico, Ca 95926
Who Am I? by Carl Sandburg
My head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I reach my hands and play with pebbles of destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs reading “Keep Off.”
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive in the universe.
![That Was the Whopper Weekend That Was [Illustrated]](https://americandigest.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/welcometohell-150x150.jpg "That Was the Whopper Weekend That Was [Illustrated]")
![Allen Ginsberg: The Interview, <strong> ➡ 1972 ⬅ </strong> [Republished by unpopular demand]](https://americandigest.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/ginsbergnirvana-150x150.jpg "Allen Ginsberg: The Interview, <strong> ➡ 1972 ⬅ </strong> [Republished by unpopular demand]")
Comments on this entry are closed.
This is why beach volleyball was invented.
“Spanning the globe..”
Bucks? Flat racist:
from The Congo: Section 1
By Vachel Lindsay
I. THEIR BASIC SAVAGERY
Fat black bucks in a wine-barrel room,
Barrel-house kings, with feet unstable,
Sagged and reeled and pounded on the table,
Pounded on the table,
Beat an empty barrel with the handle of a broom,
Hard as they were able,
Boom, boom, BOOM,
With a silk umbrella and the handle of a broom,
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM.
THEN I had religion, THEN I had a vision.
I could not turn from their revel in derision.
THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE BLACK,
CUTTING THROUGH THE FOREST WITH A GOLDEN TRACK.
Then along that riverbank
A thousand miles
Tattooed cannibals danced in files;
Then I heard the boom of the blood-lust song
And a thigh-bone beating on a tin-pan gong.
And “BLOOD” screamed the whistles and the fifes of the warriors,
“BLOOD” screamed the skull-faced, lean witch-doctors,
“Whirl ye the deadly voo-doo rattle,
Harry the uplands,
Steal all the cattle,
Rattle-rattle, rattle-rattle,
Bing.
Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, BOOM,”
A roaring, epic, rag-time tune
From the mouth of the Congo
To the Mountains of the Moon.
Death is an Elephant,
Torch-eyed and horrible,
Foam-flanked and terrible.
BOOM, steal the pygmies,
BOOM, kill the Arabs,
BOOM, kill the white men,
HOO, HOO, HOO.
Listen to the yell of Leopold’s ghost
Burning in Hell for his hand-maimed host.
Hear how the demons chuckle and yell
Cutting his hands off, down in Hell.
Listen to the creepy proclamation,
Blown through the lairs of the forest-nation,
Blown past the white-ants’ hill of clay,
Blown past the marsh where the butterflies play: —
“Be careful what you do,
Or Mumbo-Jumbo, God of the Congo,
And all of the other
Gods of the Congo,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you,
Mumbo-Jumbo will hoo-doo you.”
Source: The Congo (1915)
Uh, let’s see…
She can vault my…
no, no, no.
I got a pole for…
No, doesn’t work.
There’s a one-liner just waiting here somewhere.
JWM
succulent
A sport made for spectating if there ever was one!
Stunning!
I ran track in HS and into college (developed serious tendonitis in both shins). If there were distractions as shown in this video, I would have been ejected from the team due to not completing the workouts. I really enjoy watching athletic women in action. Those shorts——WOW! No fat girls either!!! Difficult to vault if fat.
Excellent item to post Gerard.
Pleasant. Entertaining. Pleasantly entertaining. Entertainingly pleasant.
Only one lefty?
That Charles, always HAS to drag politics into it.
Some people….
When I want to see cute rear ends, I watch baseball. Most of you guys don’t come close to being worth watching.
This figures that it was Brasil. I had the good fortune to spend 6 months working in Brasil… in an office that was adjacent to a college. It was as close to paradise as a man could get. Unfortunately, I was already married, otherwise, I would have never come back to the US.
Football anyone?
https://youtu.be/KvXSlgCMfho
Ha, ha PA Cat. About the difference between men and women and those old man butts, frogs and double knit pants.
https://youtu.be/riVntlVtRbk
I am very slow on the uptake. I had to watch it a number of times just to get the gist.
When I was on the boat in Alaska, one of the workers was a young Brazilian guy. The stories…
How on earth did you overlook this? Best butts in the MLB playoffs. 😁
https://betches.com/best-baseball-butts-mlb-playoffs-2017/
“Italy Woman’s Pole Vault”. Italian Athletics maybe on BrazilianTVHD?
I remember that poem on The Congo when I was a school kid in the deep South, years before forced integration. I think I first heard it in the 2nd or 3rd grade and it is just as true today as it was then but so few today realize it exists and understands the topic. And what’s astonishing is that the black is far more prevalent and violent than he’s ever been in history and he’s growing worse.
A pretty young woman’s butt, like that pictured, is a thing of true and stunning beauty. Doesn’t matter quite so much when we’re banging on the door of 70 with a big hammer but my memory hasn’t faded and I still appreciate them and I do remember that I had a fine time with ’em when I was younger.
I’ll take a stab at the one liner, JWM (actually a two liner)
Why is women’s weightlifting in the Olympics but not men’s powerlifting ? After all, hundreds of millions of men have done a bench press; how many people have ever done a woman’s snatc- (Don’t answer that!)
Well, whatever that number is, it’s probably equal to the the number who have done the woman’s pole vault