THE VOODOO PROPHECY

Is undoubtedly the product of a fertile brain, yet Mr. Maurice Thompson, poetically speaking, puts the wrong lens to his telescope and sees the scattered effusions of his own gifted soul, and as many random thoughts, the delusion of an alarmist. His poem, for vindictiveness and promised retribution, may be ever so fitting, yet for boldness and uncouth coloring the Negro is not so much of a strike-back, get-even-with-you race, as he pictures him to be. In fact, it is out of tune and makes a terrible discord in our harmonious feeling; so much as that we have placed ourselves under the burden of such a responsibility as to procure from the pen of one of our most talented verse writers an answer. It is an oft-asserted remark that "God holds the destinies of nations in his hands," and it is not always the uppermost thought in the Negro's mind to do some "awful thing."

We take special pleasure in placing the Voodoo Prophecy on our pages, that it may meet its fate in Mrs. Harper's answer.M.A. Majors, M.D.,Author Noted Negro Women.

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THE VOODOO PROPHECYBY MAURICE THOMPSON, THE INDEPENDENT. I am the prophet of the dusky race,The poet of wild Africa. BeholdThe midnight vision brooding in my face!Come near me,

And hear me,While from my lips the words of Fate are told.A black and terrible memory masters me-The shadow and the substance of deep wrong.You know the past, hear now what is to be,From the midnight land,Over sea and sand,From the green jungle hear my Voodoo song:

A tropic heat is in my bubbling veins,Quintessence of all savagery is mine,The lust of ages ripens in my veins,And burnsAnd yearnsLike venom-sap within a noxious vine.

Was I a heathen? Ay, I was-am stillA fetich worshipper; but I was freeTo loiter or to wander at my will;To leap and dance,To hurl my lance,And breathe the air of savage liberty.

You drew me to a higher life, you say;Ah, drove me with the lash of slavery!And I unmindful? Every cursed dayOf painAnd chainRoars like a torrent in my memory.

You make my manhood whole with equal rights?Poor, empty words! Dream you I honor them-I who have stood of Freedom's wildest heightsMy Africa,I see the dayWhen none dare touch thy garment's lowest hem.

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You cannot make me love you with your whineOf fine repentance. Veil your pallid faceIn presence of the shame that mantles mine.StandAt commandOf the black prophet of the Negro race!

I hate you, and I live to nurse my hate,Remembering when you plied the slaver's tradeIn my dear land.... How patiently I waitThe day,Not far away,When all your pride shall shrivel up and fade.

Yea, all your whiteness darkens under me!Darkened and bejaundiced, and your bloodTake in dread humors from my savagery,UntilYou willLapse into mine and seal my masterhood.

Your seed of Abel, proud of your descent,And arrogant, because your cheeks are fair,Within my loins an inky curse is pent,To floodYour blood,And stain your skin and crisp your golden hair.

As you have done by me so will I doBy all the generations of your race;Your snowy limbs, your blood's patrician blue,Shall beTainted by me;And I will set my seal upon your face!

Yea, I will dash my blackness down your veins,And through your nerves my sensuousness I'll fling;Your lips, your eyes, shall bear the rusty stainsOf Congo kisses,While shrieks and hissesShall blend into the savage songs I sing!

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Your temples will I break, your fountains fill,Your cities raze, your fields to deserts turn;My heathen fires shall shine on every hill,And wild beasts roamWhere stands your home;Even the wind your hated dust shall spurn.

I will absorb your very life in me,And mold you to the shape of my desire;Back through the cycles of all cruelty,I will swing you,And wring you,And roast you in my passion's hottest fire.

You, North and South; You, East and West,Shall drink the cup your fathers gave to me;My back still burns, I bare my bleeding breast,I set my face,My limbs I brace,To make the long, strong fight for mastery.

My serpent fetich lolls its withered lipAnd bears its shining fangs at thought of this;I scarce can hold the monster in my grip,So strong is he,So eagerlyHe leaps to meet my precious prophecies.

Hark for the coming of my countless host;Watch for my banner over land and sea;The ancient power of vengeance is not lost!Lo, on the skyThe fire clouds fly,And strangely moans the windy, weltering sea.

A FAIRER HOPE, A BRIGHTER MORN.

BY MRS. FRANCES E. W. HARPER.

From the peaceful heights of a higher lifeI heard your maddening cry of strife;It quivered with anguish, wrath and pain,Like a demon struggling with his chain.

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A chain of evil, heavy and strong,Rusted with ages of fearful wrong.Encrusted with blood and burning tears.The chain I had worn and dragged for years.

It clasped my limbs, but it bound your heart.And formed of your life a fearful part;You sowed the wind, but could not controlThe tempest wild of a guilty soul.

You saw me stand with my broken chainForged in the furnace of fiery pain.You saw my children around me standLovingly clasping my unbound hand.

But you remembered my blood and tears'Mid the weary wasting flight of years.You thought of the rice swamps, lone and dank,When my heart in hopless anguish sank.

You thought of your fields with harvest white,Where I toiled in pain from morn till night;You thought of the days you bought and soldThe children I loved, for paltry gold.

You thought of our shrieks that rent the air-Our moans of anguish and deep despair;With chattering teeth and paling face,You thought of your nation's deep disgrace.

You wove from your fears a fearful fateTo spring from your seeds of scorn and hate;You imagined the saddest, wildest thing,That time, with revenges fierce, could bring

The cry you thought from a Voodoo breastWas the echo of your soul's unrest;When thoughts too sad for fruitless tearsLoomed like the ghosts of avenging years.

Oh prophet of evil, could not your voiceIn our new hopes and freedom rejoice?'Mid the light which streams around our wayWas there naught to see but an evil day?

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Nothing but vengeance, wrath and hate,And the serpent coils of an evil fate-A fate that shall crush and drag you down;A doom that shall press like an iron crown?

A fate that shall crisp and curl your hairAnd darken your faces now so fair,And send through your veins like a poisoned floodThe hated stream of the Negro's blood?

A fate to madden the heart and brainYou've peopled with phantoms of dread and pain,And fancies wild of your daughter's shriekWith Congo kisses upon her cheek?

Beyond the mist of your gloomy fears,I see the promise of brighter years.Through the dark I see their golden hemAnd my heart gives out its glad amen.

The banner of Christ was your sacred trust,But you trailed that banner in the dust,And mockingly told us amid our painThe hand of your God had forged our chain.

We stumbled and groped through the dreary nightTill our fingers touched God's robe of light;And we knew He heard, from his lofty throne,Our saddest cries and faintest moan.

The cross you have covered with sin and shameWe'll bear aloft in Christ's holy name.Oh, never again may its folds be furledWhile sorrow and sin enshroud our world!

God, to whose fingers thrills each heart beat,Has not sent us to walk with aimless feet,To cover and crouch, with bated breathFrom margins of life to shores of death.

Higher and better than hate for hate,Like the scorpion fangs that desolate,Is the hope of a brighter, fairer mornAnd a peace and a love that shall yet be born;

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When the Negro shall hold an honored place,The friend and helper of every race;His mission to build and not destroy.And gladden the world with love and joy.

OUR HERO.

Onward to her destination,O'er the steam the Hannah sped,When a cry of consternationSmote and chilled our hearts with dread.

Wildly leaping, madly sweeping,All relentless in their sway,Like a band of cruel demons,Flames were closing round our way.

Oh! the horror of those moments;Flames above and waves below.Oh! the agony of agesCrowded in one hour of woe.

Fainter grew our hearts with anguishIn that hour with peril rife,When we saw the pilot flying,Terror-stricken, for his life.

Then a man uprose before us-We had once despised his race-But we saw a lofty purposeLighting up his darkened face.

While the flames were madly roaring,With a courage grand and high,Forth he rushed unto our rescue,Strong to suffer, brave to die.

Helplessly the boat was drifting,Death was staring in each face,When he grasped the fallen rudder,Took the pilot's vacant place.

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Could he save us? Would he save us?All his hope of life give o'er?Could he hold that fated vessel'Till she reached the nearer shore?

All our hopes and fears were centred'Round his strong, unfaltering hand;If he failed us we must perish,Perish just in sight of land.

Breathlessly we watched and waitedWhile the flames were raging fast;When our anguish changed to rapture-We were saved, yes, saved at last.

Never strains of sweetest musicBrought to us more welcome soundThan the grating of that steamerWhen her keel had touched the ground.

But our faithful martyr heroThrough a fiery pathway trod,Till he laid his valiant spiritOn the bosom of his God.

Fame has never crowned a heroOn the crimson fields of strife,Grander, nobler, than that pilotYielding up for us his life.MRS. FRANCES E. W. HARPER.