Trumpty Dumpty sat on his wall,
Trumpty Dumpty looked on toward the fall.
“I’ve won their horse race, I’ve got my own men—
I’ll make America greatest again.”
Cheered by a racist, misogynist rabble,
Trumpty Dumpty struts and he babbles—
“It’s gonna be HUGE, cause everyone loves me.
I own the party; there’s no one above me.”
In the hallways of power, the leaders are shocked—
this kind of revolt should be easily blocked,
and yet Trump has smashed the establishment boys;
he can stoop even lower than the worst red state ploys.
And smug pundits claiming, “It could not happen here”
choke on their words and cry in their beers,
“It’s the death of conservatism! Horror of horrors!
If Trump becomes president, there’ll be no tomorrow!”
So now Trumpty Dumpty wants to be crowned;
wants the Bushes to grovel, Paul Ryan to bow down.
Though he thinks he has won this political bet,
Trumpty Dumpty may find elephants never forget.
And Trumpty Dumpty will find in the race,
most voters require at least some social grace.
Small-hand obsessions and childish tweets
show the orangest candidate can’t take the heat.
While the world looks in horror, while the world holds its breath,
the voters will choose if we pull back from the death
of what makes America historically best—
patience and kindness, tolerance, respect.
But that’s not up to Trumpty; that job’s up to us!
Enough with the rhetoric—it’s time to discuss
where we’re going with neighbors, we can and we will
back away from the hatred and turn down the shrill.
Find your opposite number, have a coffee or beer—
chat for an hour, unlearn your fear.
We live here together, and together must work
to uncover and vanquish the hatred that lurks
where people feeling unheard and under attack
blame their lost future on the Latin, the Black—
don’t put your trust in a strange orange man;
let’s bring our country together again.
Catherine McGuire is a writer and artist with a deep concern for ecology and our planet's future. Her first full length poetry book, Elegy for the 21st Century, will be published in October 2016 by FutureCycle Press.