16 May 2024

Drone War-- Soldier Prepares to Meet His Maker

Russo-Ukrainian War: drone footage of a soldier crossing himself as he tries to dodge a drone with an IED.

h/t: Lord Bebo


10 February 2020

Ghost Tape #10-- Operation Wandering Soul



Also known as "Ghost Tape Number 10" was an audio mix the US military used for psychological operations in the Vietnam War against the North Vietnamese. It played deeply on the Vietnamese belief of ancestor worship, spirits and the afterlife.The Wandering Soul was played on loudspeakers installed on helicopters, PCF boats or by infiltrating infantry 'loudspeaker teams' on known enemy areas usually at night deep within the jungle.

"It exploited the belief among many of the Vietnamese people that once a person is dead the remains must be placed in an ancestral burial ground or that person will forever wander aimlessly in space. The tape was so effective that we were instructed not to play it within earshot of the South Vietnamese forces, because they were as susceptible as the Viet Cong or North Vietnamese Army. Wandering Soul' broadcasts of eerie sounds intended to represent the souls of enemy dead who have not found peace (i.e. by being buried in the village family plot)...the idea was that the sounds would at least get a Communist soldier to think about where his soul would rest in the likely event of his being killed far from home." - LTC Raymond Deitch, 6th PSYOP Battalion Commander

"The damn reverb effect of the recording is eerie. I saw and picked-up leaflets and once heard Funeral Music played over the valleys around Landing Zone Mary Ann. A Kit Carson Scout told me what the music was. This was a ghostly sound. Hell, listening to that made me want to Chieu Hoi myself. It must have been effective as hell in the jungle at night." - Unnamed 1st Infantry Division sergeant 1968-1970

"You know what we did on Nui Ba Den Mountain in 1970? The 6th PSYOP got an Air Force pilot to fly to Bangkok, to get an actual recording of a tiger from their zoo. We had a Chieu Hoi (rallier to the national government from the enemy ranks) come down the mountains and tell of a tiger that was attacking the Viet Cong for the past few weeks. So, we mixed the tiger roar onto a tape of 69-T, 'the wandering soul', and a 2-man team got up on the mountain, played the tape and 150 Viet Cong came off that mountain..." -- psywarrior.com

-- Jonny Saiga's YouTube channel


From the Editors: Michael A Aquino, ret Lt Col, of the 6th Psychological Operations Battalion - Airborne was reportedly key in this operation. He is known for being a high-ranking official in the Church of Satan and came into to conflict with Anton La Vey when La Vey pursued pecuniary concerns over the ideals of the CoS. He severed ties and founded the Church of Set in 1975.

Aquino reportedly says that helicopters would fly at night high enough so that the rotors couldn't be heard, but speaker arrays blasted the tape loud enough all night long, so that sleep was impossible. He is quoted as saying it was effective in netting surrenders from enemy forces who swore they heard the voices of ancestral ghosts.

H/T for the urge to edit by Paul Tree

22 March 2018

Stichomancy c. 1995; Wentworth Institute of Technology Library:

In the image of homo dionysiacus, man sees decadence as immanent in human nature and history. Typical exponents of this view are Schopenhaur, Nietzche, and neo-romantics like Ludwwig Klags, Spengler, and Leo Frobenius. Man is seen as a "deserter" or a faux pas of life; as a megalomaniac species of rapacious ape; as an infantile ape with a disorganized system of inner secretions; or as essentially deficient in vital powers and dependent for survival on technological means. Man's power of thought is an artificial surrogate for missing or weak instincts, and his "freedom to choose" is a euphemism for his lack of direction. Human social institutions are pitiful crutches for ensuring the survival of a biologically doomed race. Reason is regarded as separate from the soul, which belongs to the vital sphere of the body. Reason is the destructive, "demoniac" struggle with, and submergence of, the healthy activity of the soul.
-- Encyclopedia of Philosophy. "Philosophical Anthropology-- The Self-image Of Man

From the Editors: If you liked this, you'll love Philosophical Anthropology on eolss.net

04 March 2017

10-1 In Reader's Park

In my rookie year, 3 months in, I got doored on School Street. I was dispatched out of the Option office at 36 Bromfield; the job was a 44 School to 294 Wash— no shit, two blocks, literally around the corner. Traffic was tight and flowing, with every parking space filled. It wasn't a commercial zone back then, it was metered parking. The car was an older BMW, and the door just cleared my front wheel as it swung open. I went up and over through the window, and landed with the showering glass on my back on the other side. The whole thing was a mess, and I still have a piece of glass in my head for it, but this is really just the background for this other story I wanted to tell...

When I was working for Presto doing airline ticket runs, it was in the same office that Option had vacated at 36 Bromfield. Dispatch was in the front room, and we would hang out in the back between runs. I think everyone smoked in this office; we definitely blew bones in the stairwell. It was usually Spencer— when Minuteman closed their office down the hall of 36, he bought their list and ran Go-Go, and did the best art in the third floor bathroom— and Paul Tree from Think Tree, and I. Every once in while Billy Wig from Hell Toupee would be special guest star riding for Spence.

I think Paul worked for Central. They were a driver-based company from out of town, and he had never met them. He was their only biker, and they had an ever-present walker named Nancy. Nancy looked like an aged hippy, dressed in well-worn coats and crocheted hats, was always over-dressed for the weather but was always there regardless of what it was doing. She was a fixture and a curiosity.

The story I got from Paul went something like this; Nancy lived with a Central driver named Shanti in a trailer somewhere. I heard that he didn't pay taxes and didn't use banks, like he had all his money in cash in mason jars somewhere, and was pretty vocal about his politics. Mid-'90s 'off the grid' type. I knew of Shanti and didn't really care for him, he'd occasionally try to muscle-in on some courier related event, and his mannerisms were really off-putting.

So anyway, this is a few years later from that dooring as a rookie, and I'm going down School, I forget where to, but traffic's rolling, and I see Shanti, cracking the door of his parked shit-filled shitbox looking to the back up the hill. We met eyes, he saw me coming,.. and he still opened his door. The door hit my right hand, I knew immediately it was cracked somehow, but not how bad. I wasn't knocked down, I had strangely suspected he would fuck me, adjusted foot down, and dismounted.

I was totally astonished he had done it, but felt some personal blame for even trusting him. He looked, he was a driver, he knew the risks as much as I. I mean he fucking looked, as a driver should reflexively, and still did it. Maybe I'm giving the world too much credit to think a person wouldn't do that; show some consideration and then consider otherwise. But this person was Shanti.

The arguing started and moved over the curb and into the park. I don't know what stupid stuff was said, I just remember him with his greasy, ill-fitting glasses, and puffy, blue down jacket that just added to his bulk. He had a Jerry Brown pin on his jacket, and I saw this as a clear omen I was going to get nowhere with this entire incident.

I remember him saying shit like, "I thought you could make it," and this excused his failed attempt at judging if he should fling his door open into moving traffic.

When I said my hand was likely broken— I've had enough broken ones to know— he say, "You can't sue me; I don't have insurance." I was just amazed at his lack of any kind understanding, any kind of empathy, or desire to make it right. I was so stunned, I couldn't be pissed off. We knew each other, traveled in the same circle, he was a Jerry Brown supporter, and so,.. what the fuck?

This kind of back-and-forth went on for a short minute, and suddenly there's this big, curvy hippy girl stepping up. She's kind of cute though, really should've been wearing a bra, and starts chicken-necking. "Yo! Dude! I saw the whole thing! I'll show up in court and be a witness! Let's sue him!" She's super animated and jiggling and putting on that act traveler kids have.

I make an effort to calm her down enough to get back at getting no where with Shanti, and I get hit in my upper left arm from my blind-side. I turn and this really old Beacon Hill-type guy in too much tweed has just hit me with his cane and is shaking it the air at me, and yells with spittle flying, "You rotten bastard on a bike! You got what you deserved!"

I just looked at the old man with his cane and rumpled tweed, then the hippy chick and her boobs, then Shanti squinting through his glasses. I became calm and clear-headed and entirely understood what was going on and what I had to do. 

"All you people are so fucked up," I said as I rode away to make my next drop.

14 September 2016

Beautiful silence

Editor's note: This is a traditional minimalist shake-n-bake hill-stomp number usually played with a 10-key concertina and a Roland MC-303. It was reportedly heard during a recent visit to a rustic laboratory while traveling through the Appalachia when the researcher happened to come across this porch performance.

Beautiful silence
How i miss you
Now that you
Are gone

Left me here
All alone
With my mind
And this song

Beautiful silence
Before you were broken
It was like that moment
When the day broke in
And she banished blessed dawn
But it was always that moment
the whole day long

Beautiful silence
How i miss you
Now that you
Are gone

Never leave me here
Again alone
With my mind
For this long

04 June 2016

Ghosting & Falling

Like a ghost I’m falling forward
and with each step forward
to catch myself
I fall the faster.
A strip of rubber
a ribbon of hoop
a collection of sticks
that roll;
running, static
running, static
running, static...

And while I do this
a thousand songs
occupy my mind
and a thousand throngs
cavort and crash
about me and only when
I imagine
my native brother
alone in the wilds
both vulnerable
and threatening
to every challenge
and every adversity
and then all the birds
and all the small game
and the tracks of enemies
come into focus…

I collect the data
assess it and
discard what I don’t need.
Collect the data
assess it
discard…

Good things too, come from
conflicts and collisions
I have been part of many
Moby Dicks, even the parts
that suck, lived every
conflict of man
against man,
against himself,
against society,
against rule of law,
against Nature—
Ahab had even knocked up a teenage Quaker!—
every conflict, I’m against
and have survived
with lungs on fire and
drunk with the bends…

Everything is sweeping vectors
magnitudes and directions
angles of inclination
moments of inertia.
In the goodwill of
the human marketplace
the streets fold and shuffle
like decks of cards and
raucous concertina bellows
while pouting women
beautiful in their boredom
gaze down from their balconettes.
Everything comes and goes
all at once as I do, too.
I crease them
I sew them up
I clip and drag
cross a bumper crop
effortlessly slipping between
objects with a perfect economy
of motion and force,
just like the Day’s light.

10 May 2016

Sometimes when

Sometimes when
my neck is jacked up
like this between
the bedpost bars
I can hear
the bells of St. Mary's
calling to prayer.
Then I lie still to hear
the Cardinal's mate
and the Jay's response
in evensong.

27 May 2015

Σn[in Hz] ⅟∆τ is constant

through a coiled copper tube,
distilled and dripping with brilliance
each drop faceted and radiant
a diamond third eye
winking in the moonshine
a shimmering smile that
dissolves sugar cubes
from a perforated pewter spoon
billowing into milky effluvia
cupped in the gentle touch
of crystal slightly leaded
just to soften against
lips that ever thirst
more with each passing
and are never drained but always
prismatic upon consumption.
with such a long and slender neck
you shall never be emptied
no matter how many times
your heavy bottom rises.





dropping a needle in your concha,
your tympania pierced by a 
low gauge through which steel
the caliber of Big Bertha, 
bursts with a slight dimpled stretching. 
the head now a broken womb
curst with an inequity
poisoned only by the Verb, 
which disseminates towards
a grace that cannot
be Earthbound, 
has upturned heels so vulnerable
that are held in scarred palms
and are tentatively grasped
and touched in a pledge,
that wordlessly proclaim
a bounty to avoid being
turned over to the flag 
that covers those
that bore and kicked
the ass to higher
platitudes & treasons
that shimmer downward,
like confetti laced
with fallout that rains
upon skyclad wooded
forms replete with
nothing but
another





Light twice removed.
You fade to black
Every time, lunging,
Leaving airstrips,
And precipices,
And the scent of
Long nights and
No launderings.
A plea to linger,
Or not, to not 
Explode into the
Everyday of the
Everyone, but no
Holding you
Is like pinching 
The neck of a taut,
Untied balloon
In trembling fingers





Her weeps made
the sound of
duct tape stretched
fresh from the roll
used to futilely
contain the grief that
poured from her coeur

‘Lest her soul escape
like flies from a swatted
fruit rind and not remain
intact as a beam
to be refracted
to everywhence.

Is it tract, or transit
trajectory, or the impact
that makes this mote
upon my eye?





You make me shiver, Arachne,
Hanging in your web with another
Enshrouded victim, whom you
caress and suck at like
A lover, jetting about his still
twitching body, kissing him
all over, between silver thread.
Even you cannot but help
to raise a leg and shake it in
Ecstacy.

03 September 2014

never bet on saving a dancer's daylight

when we finally met
it was already the late afternoon
in the day of our time together
when you got off the bus
and I saw you in your sundress
how you waited with girlish anxiety
for the long traffic light to change
so you could cross over to me
I knew I had the green light
to be with you
for the short time you'd be here
I heard there's a rook, you said
sphinx-like smile
eager to start to explore

there were no dirges as
we tripped over worn gravestones
and spider-webbed crypts
remarking more about the life
left in the summer and the day
and in the other animals around us
wild turkeys puffed up at us
young rabbits ran away halfhearted
not able to pass up good clover
a young falcon gazed long
down at me
my totem giving me permission
to be me
what you would let me do

I miserably tried to get you
to sit by me hidden in the dell
I wanted to seize you
and run my hand up your dress
feel your dancer's thigh and butt
that's why I laughed when later
you revealed you wanted to
take me in your mouth
on top of the rook
the roof of the Hub
treetops already blanching
but the yard's workmen disturbed us

by the reflecting pond
while we talked of politics and feminism
I looked down your dress wanting
to see the nipple of your small breast
I wanted more of what I could see
I wonder if I'd have been surprised
it was pierced if I saw it
then later only pleasantly so
and too when I lifted your dress
kissing your stomach and found
you were shorn
you are a dancer after all

and funny too how I ridiculously
asked if you'd like to come to my home
and your concession was so blasé
I was still perplexed about
that sphinx-like smile
at my place I tried to think quick
about how to invite you to my room
and you honed in on my photo
of victorious Victoria Pendleton
I mumbled a few things and then
took you in my arms and kissed you
to shut you up
so you'd not wake my housemate

we both had surprises for each other
when we stripped one another
rocked and flickered in candlelight
cool sweat coating us for hours
your brown eyes twinkling in candle-dance
with each thrust
deforming that cryptic inscrutable smile
in your rise and peak
shudder and fall
nice to meet you we joked
glad you stopped by

we paused at turns
I didn't want to finish what
your exit would
we enjoyed our company our secrets
our jokes our honesty
and when the car came to pick you up
I should have known it was
already midnight in the day
of our time together

01 January 2014

Damn, son... old crank complains about kids today at shows— ƱZ at Rumor 12/26/13

Originally drafted December 27, 2013 at 3:02am

So, I went to go see
︻╦╤─ ƱZ ─╤╦︻,
who is a hardcore trap act— he plays with a mask and no one knows who he is— and the show was so f'd up, or I'm getting real old. The music was incredible, crunchy and glitchy sub-sonic hard beats. I only drank three 8 oz Red Bulls, and with the booming sound and lights and visuals and the writhing post-teens, a few times I wondered if I got slipped something, because I felt transported to some ethereal bacchanal purgatory. It was hot, but I don't get out much.

This effect began when the security guy at the door made me raise my arms Christ-like, and he actually waited for the bass-drop from the club's interior music to do the weirdest, furious frisk I've ever gotten. As I went through the gauntlet to get in a few people complimented me on my Dustrial t-shirt and Мишка gear— considering the fact that I knew I looked like an old n00b, I took it as sarcasm and felt self-conscious.

Otherwise the crowd was a huge case of class transvestism where all these young super skinny girls dressed as trashy as possible like second-string strippers. The guys were all uniform and seemed under-grown in stunted puerile sub-maleness. When the dudes danced with each other, they did this gang$ing$-vogue thing, busting moves from bad promo photos of hip-hop acts from the '90s to a 4:4 beat. When they danced with the girls it was in a hyperbolic pantomime of being presented with presents on Christmas morning, and then they fell into a lackluster parody of the girls' failed grind and wiggle. Roaming photographers only added to the rippling spasms which were rewarded with dude's business card.

One girl had a Santa-like bathrobe clutched tightly around her. She jumped on a table, whipping it open revealing ample jiggle and shake, popping out of a "dress" that was like a tight fitting cannoli shell of some man-made plastic that was more midsection-covering than anything. Since there was no show-stopping reaction, she covered herself back up and scuttled off pouting. Another butch punk girl roughly pegged her girlfriend right in front of me.

I stayed in the same place, leaning against a pillar the whole show and a few girls playfully bumped me asking me why I wouldn't dance. Rather than shout over the noise, that as an old Boston punk I was accustomed to standing fixed in place and listening, and maybe bobbing my head in approval, as we all did back in the day, I said, "I'm just here for the music-- what are you here for?"

The highlight of the night was getting my coat back from the less than diligent coat check girl. The layout of the club had a stairway that the drunk, rolling kids stumbled down into a space smaller than my bedroom with three choices that were difficult to make for most who arrived there, two separate bathrooms, and the coat check. The girl was there with a less than patient security dude. As the crowd piled in, drunk kids, eyes wide with vanished pupils crushed and surged like oversexed zombies. I really wasn't sure what the criteria was for being charged with groping, but I definitely felt cheapened by a few uncomfortable moments of unwelcomed frottage.

At one point some girl yelled something unintelligible and punched a guy in the head several times. This caused the security guard to leave, and service slowed while the crowd began to shout "USA, USA, etc." if it was foreigners holding up the line, or barking "Coatcheck?" to which several returned the query in good comedic timing. I glared at the few who tried to cut in front of me and they yielded the way. I handed my ticket with a dollar bill to the security guy who had returned, got my coat quickly, and I turned to fight the crowd upstream. They actually parted, yelling, "Let him through!" One chimed in, "He's a handsome young man!" To which I replied, "It's my birthday." Since it was after midnight, I was 45.

03 November 2013

Route Seventy-three; 'Meet me at da Dunkins'

there's this couple
who ride my bus
they look like
they're serious pillheads
opiates and benzos
they are probably
much older then they look
but they've been together
a long time
you can tell
because they
look so much alike
they have the same expression
all the time
their faces are
deeply creased and
chaotic dashed lines
mar everywhere else
the skin looks like
it is about to slide
off their skulls
their eyelids hang
like thick heavy awnings
i've never seen
their eyes open
just squinting enough
to scratch tickets
or screw with an old phone
their mouths share
the same grim frown
i've never seen
if they have teeth but
they have too much cheek
it hangs loose on the sides
while their neck skin
is shrinkwrapped
under their jaws
they have the same
nasal raspy whine
but his is a tone
or two lower
they always wear shapeless
boston sports fan
activewear
and faded baggy unisex jeans
their slouching posture
makes their bodies look like
they are about to
slide off their Selves
so much do they look alike
they both wear a lot of
cheap yellow gold
he has big ink blots for tattoos
the high-dollar tickets
they scratch
have odds of 1 : 8.33
for even money
[i looked it up]
they mumble to themselves
or each other
while they scratch them
their phone conversations
are insane
like today it was only her
i sat two seats away
she fiddled with an
old junk phone
it rang and she answered it
hello
hello
hello
hello
each time her tone was
more confused and irritated
a question to the void
i wondered how it
would be to
live like that
two stops before
the train station
she made a call
every thing she said
was a loud confused question
lynn
hello
lynn
i'm almost dere
where d'ya
where d'ya wanna ta meet me
i'm on da bus
almost ta hahvahd
da seventie-tree
at da station
what
what
yur goin in an out
yur goin
i'm almost at da tunnel
where
where
mmm
ah
da dunkins
da dunkins
mmm
by da trains
da dunkins by da trains
downstayahs
okay
i'll be dere
da dunkins by da trains
a few min
i'm going down da tunnel now
i'll be right dere
yeh
bye
yeh
oink-ok
bye
when i got off the bus
i had to get away from her
as fast as i could
while waiting to pay my fare
in the station by the trains
i looked over at the dunkins
lynn was there
dirty blond hair
pulled back
in a tight ponytail
with matching grey
baggy sweatpants and shirt
and immaculate white sneakers

08 June 2013

Maturation of Wine || Trans. by L.S. Todt:

Trans. by L.S. Todt:

Note to the Editors. While at the farmsale of a local vintner, I came across a small and curious volume in a box of old books. The entire book was in Old French, with the above title. The first part was a botanical guide to different types of grapes for wine, and the second was concerned with the process of blending and ageing them. The third seemed to be a fragment of a novel entitled "Imperator Du Vin." I believe this translation would be of interest to your readers.

It is with great sorrow and desolation that I, Tria Oculo, scribe to my Liege, tell of His last days. It was my news of the bearded Nazarene that had stricken him with that perpetual ennui of the day after. It was I who provoked in Him, The Deep Sounder, the desire to return to Thebes. I have forsaken my own savoir and Gentle Master.

He who saved me, a Sacred Virgin of Naxos, from the invading Herculi. Those infidels who violated me, rendering mute and deaf. It was Bacchus, the Careless Lord, whom I saved and committed to another realm

Since the massacre of his followers and Constantine’s conversion of the Empire to the Christ, we had taken refuge the deserted estate of a bankrupt vintner in Illyricum. That land, as much of the Empire had ceased to be fertile. The numbers of my Lord's worshiper's had dwindled, it was only a few who declared their devotion, and still it was only convenient for them to do so.

There was Debacchus, that whimpering simp of ill-prudus, who was the ungrateful son of my Liege and an acolyte of Medea. He whom the Father of Liberty did take charge over to avoid suit of paternity and palimony from the causidicus. Those are dark days when a God can be sued.

And Sardia Licentia, whom Sapho's high priestess did lure down from the Caucus range with a trail of oysters and mussels, to a boat filled with lobsters and crabs and, set sail for Lesbos. There she was drafted into service, and achieved the rank of Sergeant-at-Arms. However having hunted all the stags and trapped all the ganders of that isle she fell victim to Diana's jealousy, and she was forced to wander as the eternal huntress. Having been intrigued with the strength and fierceness of the Bacchanals, particularly my Liege’s own aunts, she was mercenaried as His protector.

By far His Most Fidelus was Bababalouk, the Great Dark Giant of Tremendous Girth, the former Emperor of Sudan, who was enslaved by the Perses and made a eunuch for their petty harems. Meus Rex did find him in the woods, having escaped and suffering fron several wounds in the belly from their scimitars. The oil that oozed from his avulsions was tapped into our empty lamps, which lit the many nights he was nursed to health with grapes and olives. Bababalouk’s devotion never wavered and for this Bacchus frequently restored him to his former virilitas.

The Maenads, those most mysterious of spirits, are those who always accompany and herald Him. Some say they are simulacra of the nurses of Jove's Most Pious Bastard, to others they are his incarnated aunts, the daughters of Cadmus. It is they who shine in the drunken maid's eye. Their form is ever shifting, their number unknown, both befit their fancy. Sometimes they are swarm of thighs and breasts, of carameled hair, kohled eyelids, and hungry mouths. Other times, as then upon our departure from that refuge in the hills, they took the shape of five Egyptian slave girls with tibae and sistrum, accompanied by a peacock and his hen who with their music they incited into a mating dance.

Bacchus' litter was supported by a company of statues of soldiers from the court of Pluto, who in flesh were victims of the Gorgon's, gaze. They had been reanimated for divine attention, and many were missing noses, heads or arms lost in faithful service.

We had journeyed far in the Dalmatian Mountains. into the glowing hills of Uranium, whose realm was governed by Regina Cerratonium. She was a barren queen who desired a great son to rule over her decrepit kingdom. All the young men had expired from exhaustion from her wanton, yet futile desire. Those that were virile enough to survive the crush of her great thighs, had paid for their efforts of spilling their seed into her broken womb with their heads. Her court now depleted, she took audience only with the vermin that proliferated in great abundance. She greatly admired these rats, for their ability to reproduce, and hoped vainly that their fertility would somehow relieve her of her great desire.

She never left her bed, a great walled eiderdown sunken in the middle of her chambers, and let these rodents scurry freely about in her presence. She cooed to them and spoke soft and lovingly, declaring them her children.

29 May 2013

Sister Autumnal by Charlotte Praecox Regina

Sister Autumnal by Charlotte Praecox Regina

Sister Autumnal
you of equal night
how you blush
in the weary hour
of fading & lighted touches
which push us beneath
quilted bed clothes
embroidered
with emblazoned
Maples & Elms
with lips stained
by Blackberries,
your nape
smells of greened Apples
you bring me deeper
to embrace
this dark & great slumber

20 December 2012

GHETTO ASS WITCH (FEAT. GVCCI​-​HVCCI) [BLIND BINDINGS REMIX]

GHETTO ASS WITCH (FEAT. GVCCI​-​HVCCI)
[BLIND BINDINGS REMIX]

from GHETTO ASS WITCH - REMIXES VOLUME ONE by RITUALZ