Donald Trump has never heard of T.S. Eliot, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948.
Many Eliot scholars consider that his Four Quartets is his last great work, as did the poet.
Four Quartets consists of four interlinked meditations, with the common theme being man’s relationship with time, the universe, and the divine.
Burnt Norton, published in 1936, is the first of the Four Quartets. The poem includes many abstract, nearly ineffable, verses.
The third section of Burnt Norton, beginning with “Here is a place of disaffection/Time before and time after/In a dim light: neither daylight/Investing form with lucid stillness…” continues with “Neither plenitude nor vacancy. Only a flicker/Over the strained time-ridden faces/Distracted from distraction by distraction/Filled with fancies and empty of meaning/Tumid apathy with no concentration/Men and bits of paper…"
Trump thinks he knows all there is to know about science, as we have already reported (https://www.apocryphalpress.com/2020/04/23/trump-s-total-ignorance-of-science-and-knowledge-and-what-everyone-should-know-about-georgia-s-governor/).
Which is why those of his advisers whom he has not yet fired (and Trump's Secretary of Health and Human Services, Alex Azar -- he who came straight from Big Pharma -- may be the next to be axed by the Trumpian axe -- why? 'cause Azar's HHS includes the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases, as in Dr. Anthony Fauci, its Director) are trying to get him forever away from his three-hour daily press briefings on the coronavirus pandemic, which he’s totally incapable of handling (https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/25/trump-team-2020-polling-207675).
Trump’s aides have been totally foiled by a leader with a penchant for thinking out loud and following his own instincts over those — such as Drs. Fauci and Birx — with expertise and specialized training (https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/25/politics/donald-trump-coronavirus-task-force-science/index.html).
Why did we begin this post by emphasizing Eliot's “Distracted from distraction by distraction”?
To answer that, we texted associate solitary reporter Anthony Newcom, a professor of English at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
“SR,” Professor Newcom said, “I didn’t realize that you are a T.S. Eliot scholar wannabe.”
“Yesterday,” Professor Newcom continued, "Trump’s coronavirus press appearance was so — should I say Over the Top, or should I say, Over the Bottom?”
“Trump is so horribly incompetent in dealing with the COVID-19 Pandemic, that he’s totally and completely desperate to find a
Quick Fix — only, as his science advisers, like Dr. Anthony Fauci, and Dr. Deborah Birx, know full well that there simply is no such thing as a Quick Fix."
“He spouts off about an untested anti-malaria drug that somebody like Dr. Oz told him might fix the problem.”
“Then he went off on sunlight and Lysol, and the manufacturer of Lysol had to announce immediately that Lysol should never, ever be ingested, although the Lysol people think that he’s done exactly that.”
“Which is why, SR, you chose the perfect expression from
Eliot — Distracted from distraction by distraction — to describe Trump’s mind — because he got himself to the Oval Office by distracting his base from thinking about what really matters in our country — and because he’s a master of throwing reporters off track — only we have a free press in this country.”
Associate solitary reporter Johanna Jones, who is with Trump 24/7, is, at this very moment, with the White House physician, Dr. Sean Conley, who is in the process of transferring Trump to the nearest psychiatric hospital.