Poetic Justice
Donald Trump’s been indicted. A word about that — both the legal justice and the poetic one. If you follow my work, one might know that I am a fan of the author “Edgar Allen Poe.” Poe wrote of madness, of evil and was particularly fascinated with the theme of being buried alive. He died much too young and much too tragically but did leave behind a legacy of literary genius.
The Tell-Tale Heart, in particular, reminds me of Donald Trump or, rather, the nameless narrator does. The stories of the narrator in Poe’s tale and Donald Trump differ strongly but the insanity of both glistens nonetheless.
And like Poe’s narrator, Trump is busy trying to insist that he’s not crazy. Indeed, Trump, a victim of the the night’s insane shadows, will not stop posting on Truth Social insisting that he is merely misunderstood, a decent fellow, a man with a heart and vibrant soul, a man being framed, a good and kind servant of the people.
Only that narrative has been shattered. He is now indicted. And Trump may not be legally insane in the clinical sense. But he is definitely a man unwilling to take responsibility for his mistakes.
Consider this wild post that [it appeared on Truth Social just the other night (or rather in the early morning hours.)
“Wow, this is turning out to be the greatest & most vicious instance of election interferance in the history of our country.”
“I’m leading Biden by a lot.”
“Fake investigations against me RIGHT SMACK IN THE MIDDLE OF MY CAMPAIGN, Something which is unheard of & not supposed to happen.”
“DOJ, FBI, NEW YORK D.A., ATLANTA D.A. FASCISTS ALL.”
Wow. I mean, that’s a lot, even for him. So many people — millions — have waited for the day of vengeance against Donald Trump. And now it is here. He is AN INDICTED MAN. He did it to himself, just like Poe’s narrator.
As I’ve said before, we were all in an abusive relationship with a madman. And now it’s over — we got out. And we did not like being abused. So it stands to reason we’d want justice, right?
We will get legal justice. He’s been indicted. But let me talk of poetic justice. That we’ve already obtained. One can see it in the madness, the bizarre aspects of Donald Trump’s posts.
And perhaps this explains the similarities of the narrator in the telltale Heart to Trump. Both men were haunted. Poe’s narrator was haunted by his own guilt, which drove him deeper into madness. Trump is haunted by the fact that he’s finally been caught, finally been lassoed. All the money in the world couldn’t buy his freedom now.
And what you see spilling forth on truth social is in many ways symbolic of Trump’s disease, of the crazed indignation eating away at his soul. He’s tired. Trump is a tortured soul, a miserable shell that comes from years of misery. His own self did him in. And that, more than anything, is poetic justice.
