rump state in poetry

after the fall of Rome
at the end of Pax Romana
a succession of increasing insignificant rump states
carried on in vain
parading around the empire’s name
as if the moniker itself would bestow on them a greatness
it couldn’t and it shouldn’t
it wouldn’t
it didn’t

we won’t be fooled now either
as petulant tyrant children
flay the corpse of America alive
as they prance about in a skinsuit
made from America’s tortured
tanned and dried and leathered hide
claiming to be
America

we knew what America was
we know what America was trying to be
in fits and starts and reaching grasps
what it could have been
before the monsters surfed on in
on a wave of espionage and lies
though they will
pretend to act surprised
when we call them out on the fact
that they are not America
that’s not how this story goes
even they know they are frauds
emperors wearing the corpses
of an improving dream betrayed by fear and hate
over some charlatan’s bones
just a little insignificant trump state
like all those little fading embers
cast out from the fires of Rome