Phillip Fried, 'Ballad'
Ballad
COUNTERINSURGENCY (December 2006),
Headquarters, Department of the Army
Galloping with his drum, the singer
Rides in a split second over
Plains that outdistance their tympanum sky,
And all by the song’s power.
Ideology gallops the story:
What values spur the teller?
Down a “smoke-hole,” he comes to the shore
Of a cavern-sea to be crossed.
On a bridge the breadth of a hair, he totters
Over the drowned and lost.
Never wrongfoot your informers.
Shield them from retribution.
To appease the netherworld’s vengeful Khan,
He pours a gift of liquor
From the limitless shell of his drum, then softly
Taps out the hetman’s hiccups.
Fa-la for what’s known to PSYOPS:
The psyche’s the theater of war.
To obtain the vital intelligence
That bears on a blessing or cure,
He must wheedle, deceive, and lean on
The chief of a somber empire.
With intel, a counterinsurgent
Can excise the social tumor.
The soul shears free from the body to go
On subterranean missions,
But a mystic geography is sown
With hidden demolitions.
O religions and all -isms
Are types of belief systems.
Because they won’t accept their new mode,
The recently dead are feared,
But, as informants and guardians,
The long dead are revered.
Culture’s the crackable code
That guides all tribes and clans.
Armed with his drum alone, the singer
Projects the power of sound,
Leading those slow to forsake the air
To their gritty new home in the ground.
Heigh-ho for the social skeleton,
Culture’s the muscle on bone.
By Phillip Fried
COUNTERINSURGENCY (December 2006),
Headquarters, Department of the Army
Galloping with his drum, the singer
Rides in a split second over
Plains that outdistance their tympanum sky,
And all by the song’s power.
Ideology gallops the story:
What values spur the teller?
Down a “smoke-hole,” he comes to the shore
Of a cavern-sea to be crossed.
On a bridge the breadth of a hair, he totters
Over the drowned and lost.
Never wrongfoot your informers.
Shield them from retribution.
To appease the netherworld’s vengeful Khan,
He pours a gift of liquor
From the limitless shell of his drum, then softly
Taps out the hetman’s hiccups.
Fa-la for what’s known to PSYOPS:
The psyche’s the theater of war.
To obtain the vital intelligence
That bears on a blessing or cure,
He must wheedle, deceive, and lean on
The chief of a somber empire.
With intel, a counterinsurgent
Can excise the social tumor.
The soul shears free from the body to go
On subterranean missions,
But a mystic geography is sown
With hidden demolitions.
O religions and all -isms
Are types of belief systems.
Because they won’t accept their new mode,
The recently dead are feared,
But, as informants and guardians,
The long dead are revered.
Culture’s the crackable code
That guides all tribes and clans.
Armed with his drum alone, the singer
Projects the power of sound,
Leading those slow to forsake the air
To their gritty new home in the ground.
Heigh-ho for the social skeleton,
Culture’s the muscle on bone.
By Phillip Fried