When credibility declines
What rises in its place?
A change occurs, but by what signs
Falls grace into disgrace?
It does not take a putrid stench
But merely innuendo
First to suggest, if not to clench,
Ere rising to crescendo,
That something rancid, something foul’s
Befallen reputation,
A slight corruption in the bowels
As leads to complication.
Such happened to the highest court
A country ever knew,
As tremulous the pianofort
From pianissimo grew,
Until was heard a raucous sound
With clangs and bangs and thuds,
No harmonies—but # # #!—
As fortes flew in floods.
’Twas wild abandon! as though it
Were hammered by a monkey,
Because upon that bench did sit
Pretender and a flunky.
Justice a lovely concert was
But now the orchestra
Lapses to chaos: Gorsuch plays
Contemptuous of the law.
Such happens when you seat a louche—
Once august and revered
The Court succumbs to scaramouche,
Reputation impaired.
Could even military loss
Be half so fraught as this?
A reputation so to toss,
In the analysis,
As though it so much ballast were,
A thing to be discarded—
But, came the day, change did occur,
Spoilt what should have been guarded.