A Confederacy of Dumptys: Portraits of American Scoundrels in Verse

by John Lithgow

Fun is the best possible antidote to ulcerous rage. If I hadn’t turned to humor, Dumpty’s ruthless and sloppy despotism would have done me in.

I’m convinced that no matter how hard he struggles to regain power, Dumpty will eventually drop into the scorned ranks of our history’s villains, and we will survive him.

Trumpty Dumpty was losing the race. A scowl beclouded his bright orange face. Watching his margin increasingly widen, He raged at his nemesis, Sleepy Joe Biden.

Scoundrels abound and their damage is ample. Dumpty is merely the latest example.

Since we don’t have to deal with this swine anymore, Let’s remember the Dumptys who’ve all gone before.

SARAH HOWE, a Boston fortune-teller, made her own fortune in 1879 and 1880 using a pyramid scheme that was later associated with CARLO PONZI. She served three years in prison for fraud, but then reprised her scheme in other cities. After another arrest in 1888, she resumed her previous career of fortune-telling.

When a scoundrel from history exits the stage, Fictions will turn into facts as they age.

In 1876, BENJAMIN RYAN TILLMAN led a white paramilitary group, called the Red Shirts, that massacred Black militiamen in the town of Hamburg, South Carolina, and used violence to suppress Black votes. Tillman was elected governor of South Carolina in 1890 and became a U.S. senator four years later. During his twenty-three years in the Senate, he supported white supremacy, lynching, and the use of anti-Black terror to win elections.

Everywhere that Mary went, The scourge was sure to go.

Their dirty little secret was: not one of them could stand him.

No congressman of recent years is quite so creepy-crawly (Except for Cruz, McConnell, Nunes, Gohmert, Gaetz, and Hawley).

Each unburdened of his crime, Free to live a life of ease: Dumpty’s recent pardonees!

Ted Cruz, that lardaceous baboon, Is the maestro of inopportune. With his state in deep freeze This titan of sleaze Took his family off to Cancún.

Marjorie Taylor Greene Is a fountain of hatred and spleen. When she opens her trap Her fanatical crap Can shatter a video screen.

Ms. Maxwell was Epstein’s old flame Until both were consumed by their shame. But in all their shared history, The thorniest mystery Is how to pronounce her first name.

RUDY GIULIANI, Dumpty attorney

At the crack of dawn in Washington, first Wednesday of the year, The sky was blue, the sun was bright, the air was crystal clear. Like a child on Christmas morning, Dumpty quivered with excitement At the prospect of a day of demagogical incitement. A plot was taking shape that day, transcending all his dramas. He rehearsed it pacing up and down in slippers and pajamas. Padding to a window with a view of the Ellipse, He whispered “Stop the Steal” through a pair of trembling lips. Elsewhere in the capital, responding to his call, Thousands of his followers were spoiling for a brawl. Dumpty’s private infantry of goth conventioneers Had mustered all their forces to secure him four more years. The night before, they’d gathered for a warm-up demonstration To stoke the glowing embers for the next day’s conflagration. Their cheers were heard for hours on end throughout the dark metropolis

For pardoned felons Roger Stone, Mike Flynn, and Papadopoulos. By 8 a.m. they hit the streets, prepared for open battle. They filled their lungs with frosty air and roared like angry cattle. Armed with helmets, baseball bats, bear spray, and chest protectors, They railed against the verdict of the College of Electors. As Dumpty gave his makeup and his hair a final glance, His rabble-rousers crowded the Ellipse’s broad expanse. They evoked a mini-Woodstock in a ghastly new edition: The Summer of Love refashioned as the Winter of Sedition. They’d assembled there to topple an election they reviled At a rally Dumpty promised them on Twitter “will be wild!” The POTUS and his entourage were ushered to a tent Where he watched with glee the speeches at the start of the event: Mo Brooks and Amy Kremer and that ravenous akita, The fierce and fiery Guilfoyle, reenacting her Evita; Ken Paxton, Donald Junior, and that addle-pated wombat Rudy Giuliani with his call for “trial by combat.” Drunk on fake conspiracy and manufactured facts, The hopped-up herd bought every word of Dumpty’s opening acts. Primed for demagoguery and energized by rage, They howled in adoration when the POTUS took the stage.

What followed was a tirade of interminable duration With Dumpty spewing cataracts of rank disinformation. Rehashing all his paranoid and solipsistic themes, He took boastfulness and grievance to Wagnerian extremes. The multitude was mirthful when he aimed his brash artillery At Oprah, Stacey Abrams, Hunter Biden, Joe, and Hillary. But the raucous celebration turned malignant and unpent When Dumpty voiced his doubts about his own vice president. Ten minutes from the rally in an easterly direction, Congress sat to certify the national election. Thus Dumpty’s words had introduced a note of dark suspense: The tally would be rendered by Vice President Mike Pence. Dumpty since November had defied his certain fate, Hammering officialdom in every crucial state. By now his only option was to grasp at final straws, Beseeching Pence to flout the law and put the vote on pause. The crow...

POTUS finished with a vision of “our brightest days before us,” And the crowd responded fervently in unironic chorus. On the heels of the militias, in the grips of Dumpty’s thrall, A many-headed monster lumbered eastward down the Mall. Post-rally, Dumpty hurried to his White House habitation, His orange face the picture of postcoital consummation. He settled in the Oval Office just in time to see The fruits of all his labors airing live on Fox TV. In the Capitol, electoral proceedings had begun. Outside, the western barricades were breached and overrun. The assembled legislators were completely unaware As Mike Pence defied the POTUS and ascended to the Chair. Though the ou...

A seething, swelling human sea of angry insurrection. The horde streamed up the granite steps past every cop and sentry, Smashing every windowpane to gain illegal entry. Desperate calls to activate the waiting National Guard Were greeted by the Pentagon with baffling disregard. Once inside, the raging tide continued to advance, Shaking the Rotunda with their caterwauling chants. The senators and congressmen, in panic and confusion, Were hustled from their chambers and sequestered in seclusion. Ramping up the anarchy with cries of jubilation, The rioters ran roughshod through the temple of the nation. Capitol security, so grievously outmanned, Fought in vain through stress and pain to make a final stand. At the White House, Dumpty reveled in this mutinous typhoon Like a happy toddler bingeing on his favorite cartoon. Throwing fuel upon the fire, he sent out a peevish tweet Attacking Pence’s willingness to certify defe...

The invasion, like a torrent wiping out a DC picnic, Swept away a Capitol policeman, Brian Sicknick, Then claimed a second victim at the Speaker’s Lobby door: Ashli Babbitt took a bullet and fell backward to the floor. Minority chief McCarthy, in his desperate hour of need, Got Dumpty on the phone and begged his boss to intercede. Though Kevin was by habit Dumpty’s deferential drudge, Despite his frantic plea, the sodden POTUS wouldn’t budge. Lounging in the Oval, Dumpty sipped a Diet Coke And with slack self-satisfaction cracked a condescending joke: “Well, Kev,” he said, and wiped a blob of ketchup off his shoe, “It looks like this election has them more upset than you.” With the melee grabbing half the planet’s horrified attention, Dumpty’s inner circle staged a nervous intervention. They timidly suggested that the POTUS might release A presidential order to stand down and keep the peace. Dumpty grudgingly consented in a sour and surly sulk. He polished off his Burger King and hoisted up his bulk, Then stood before a camera and addressed the angry mob, Concealing his delight at how they’d carried out their job. In its paper-thin hypocrisy, his video epistle

Was a minute-long rendition of his usual dog whistle. Between the lines, he signaled “voter fraud” with wordless clarity And offered up “We love you” with transparent insincerity. But Dumpty’s words, alas, were far too little and too late. The damage was inflicted, and the horse had left the gate. On the Hill, the mob receded, their destructive passion spent, Convinced that they’d exulted their exalted president. The Capitol lay desecrated, vandalized, and scarred At the tragic late arrival of the luckless National Guard. They beheld the bludgeoned victims of the brutalizing throng, Soldiers in a war against a monumental wrong. At 8 p.m., like hostages delivered from a cage, Congress reassembled in a state of righteous rage. After hiding out for hours in political perdition, They were stubbornly intent upon accomplishing their mission.

Straining on past midnight, they ignored the passing hours, Their heavy lift a peaceful shift of governmental powers. Across the floor at 10 to 4, at last the vote was called: Joe Biden, a new president, was finally installed. At dawn, the Congress stumbled out past stacks of trash and rubble, Riding out a day and night of terror, toil, and trouble. Though haunted by the echo of the long-departed crowd, Our beleaguered old democracy was bloodied but unbowed. In the White House, Dumpty thundered after thirty sleepless hours, Raging at the loss of all his autocratic powers. But his fury sputtered unexpressed for lack of a transmitter: His ravings had been muted by his banishment from Twitter. He staggered to his bedroom where he crumpled in a heap. His adrenaline expended, he was desperate for sleep. His head, beset by tortured thoughts, was pounding like a drum, But when soothing sleep descended, Dumpty dreamed of things to come...

That McCarthy, who’d exhibited a modicum of spine, Would travel down to truckle at the Mar-a-Lago shrine; That McConnell, after slamming Dumpty on the Senate floor, Said he’d absolutely vote for him in 2024. POTUS dreamed he’d be an absentee at Joe’s inauguration, The fourth of only four throughout the history of the nation. Despite his courtroom belly flops, he dreamed he wouldn’t quit Since Joe’s administration wouldn’t ever be legit. He dreamed that he’d fall silent in his tenure’s aftermath, Lying low at Mar-a-Lago to devise his future path. With a keynote speech at CPAC, he’d regain his strident voice And prove that he remained his party’s overwhelming choice. He dreamed of three combative years, a struggl...