What rough beast?

Hamlet was paralyzed by inaction: not only was he melancholy, he was damned by inaction, as he would be damned by action, if he took it.

Here was his situation: He learned, through extraordinary means, that his uncle had murdered his father, so as to marry Hamlet’s mother and become king. With that act, Hamlet’s uncle became his stepfather.

Hamlet, as prince, was double-bound to act: to avenge the murder of his father, and the murder of his king. But to do so, he would be triply damned: a regicide, a parricide, and the murderer of his mother’s husband.

Damned if he didn’t and damned if he did.

No matter what Hamlet’s personal qualities, by the end of Act I, Hamlet has become defined by his situation. He didn’t choose it: he became it, or it became him.

Psychiatrists might call Hamlet’s situation a double bind. I prefer to call it a paradox. Hold that thought, while we consider this year’s elections.

Electorally, our country is as closely divided, in numbers, as it’s ever been; while at the same time the two sides are farther apart politically than at any time since the Civil War.

This being the case — and there is no denying that it is the case — it’s clear that the winners of the next presidential election will not be determined by policies, or persuasion, or that horrible word “electability” — it will come down to turnout: Who will get their troops out to vote, en masse.

Here the situation looks grim. Pardon me for quoting two poets in one column, but William Butler Yeats nailed our situation 105 years ago: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

Need I expatiate? Unless a lot of things change mighty fast, the voters full of passionate intensity in November will outnumber the prospective voters who lack conviction.

(Not that kind of conviction; conviction in the sense of self-assurance. In fact, as we’ve already seen, conviction, civil or criminal, does not seem to affect people full of passionate intensity in our perishing republic today.)

And that will be the end of this particular ballgame. And then?

“Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;

“Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

“The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

“The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst

“Are full of passionate intensity.”

But wait: It’s worse than you think. Surely, many readers will remember some of these lines, written in 1919. But how many of us remember the title of the poem?

That’s right, it’s “The Second Coming.”

Can anyone spare me an anti-emetic?

Anyone? Anyone? No?

All right. Let’s get this over with.

In a nod toward the war in Gaza, with another nod to Stupor Tuesday, let’s see how Yeats’s “Second Coming” ends: