Empire’s Masks Have Fallen
by Peter F. Crowley / April 13th, 2025
When facades are gone,
When masks have been thrown into the gutter,
When the extractive, transactional reality at the gut
is exposed and held up to the faces of the periphery,
When soft power’s smiles have turned into petulant
bankers asking the weaker to pay up,
When liberals grow nostalgic for the
good old days of USAID, Genocide Joe,
drone presidents and illegal invasions sheathed
in humanitarian rhetoric.
For now it is just too direct.
Empire does not last without convoluted theater.
As a prolific author from the Boston area, Peter F. Crowley writes in various forms, including short fiction, op-eds, poetry and academic essays. In 2020, his poetry book Those Who Hold Up the Earth was published by Kelsay Books and received impressive reviews by Kirkus Review, the New Age and two local Boston-area newspapers. His writing can be found in Middle East Monitor, Znet, 34th Parallel, Pif Magazine, Galway Review, Digging the Fat, Adelaide’s Short Story and Poetry Award anthologies (finalist in both) and The Opiate. His books That Night and Other Stories (CAAB Publishing) and Empire’s End (Alien Buddha Press) were released during the week of Friday the 13th in October 2023.
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This article was posted on Sunday, April 13th, 2025 at 8:00am and is filed under Poetry.
