Peter Crowley is an independent writer and scholar with a M.S. in Conflict Resolution, Global Studies from Northeastern University. He works as Content Specialist/Production Coordinator for a prominent library science company. For fun, he plays in bluesy rock band around the Boston/NYC area. His writings can be found in Boston Literary Magazine, Mondoweiss, Mint Press News, (several publications in) Wilderness House Literary Review, 34th Parallel Magazine, Counterpunch, Foreign Policy Journal, Work Literary Magazine, Opiate Magazine, Truthout, Green Fuse Press, Antiwar.com, Rhinocerotic, Peace Studies Journal, Ethnic Studies Review, Libertarian Institute, Middle East Monitor, Dissident Voice, Inquiries Journal and a periodical publication of the Brookline, MA Historical Society.

What we know, we already know

They ate October for lunch,
wiped their lips with handkerchief
and drew a map of the world

Ginsburg’s Gog and Magog
haunted mirrors’ forgotten gaze
and ate salad as an afterthought

What we know, we already know
What we know, we already know
We already know what we know

It is imperishable, like the taste of
guava on a Dhaka morning
with heat on the seat
and war on the roads
It doesn’t break down from tiny
black hole slices in the mirror’s gulping
Adam’s apple, nor from the stinking,
putrid odor of truth.
It will tell us where we are on GPS
even if we lurk in a city fathoms away

And when we say we’ll live forever,
Gog and Magog clap, not without a hint of
irony, behind the marauding theater curtain
drawn during a restless sleep

[image: Fall of Gog and Magog | John Singer Sargent]