Empire Studies
Image by Maarten van den Heuvel via Unsplash
Empire operates in absolutes:
If you call for ceasefire,
It will say you are full of hate.
If you say what about the children,
It will say you are a sympathizer.
If you look and see the humanity
in the rubble of a school, a minaret brought low,
a hospital…levelled…a cemetery defiled
It will say that there were tunnels.
Empire holds no quarter for dissent.
Its enemies; the well-informed informant,
the scribes, the poets.
Empire trades in half-truths.
Its allies are sophistry and fear.
Empire is efficient
at greed, at weaponizing belief,
systematic.
It can make you less than human to justify
its brutality towards you.
It can make you less than human to accept its brutality
towards others.
Empire is exhausting.
Empire persuades
us to tolerate terrible things.
Injecting us with key phrases:
acceptable losses, proportionate response, collateral damage,
human shields.
The loss of human shields is acceptable collateral damage,
for Empire, a proportionate response.
For empire, this is the way.
For Empire will cast a wide net, ensnare you to
thinking that the business of your safety is grim
and someone must dirty their hands.
But Empire, will hide the blood and never tell you
that it cannot keep you safe
because that is not its purpose.
Empire will dictate where you should look:
with a vice grip pressuring your temples.
But you will hear chants of the living
and you will feel the weight of their words
and your throat will burn from the rising
because Empire is persistent
but no more persistent than
the heart of struggle.
Empire will pressure your brain
but you must turn your head still,
turn your head still.
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