The Fool

I try to spend as little of my time as possible thinking about Donald Trump.  Which is difficult, since even CNN is constantly shoving his Yuge down my throat. 

But there are times when I can't help thinking about The Donald.  Such as when I picked up a book entitled Fifty Soviet Poets and read this poem:

A horse should be feared from the tail-end, my friend:
From the fore-end--the cow and the bull.
But--
        from all points of view, 
                                               from beginning to end,
Beware, beware of the fool!

Whenever a fool is installed in the place
Intended by right for the wise
The fool's true identity promptly to trace
Is hard for the keenest of eyes. 1 

For sometimes a fool may be glib and polite,
Not at all an inveterate brute.
The fool may be able to speak and to write
Or to be quite impressively mute.

One fool single-handed can muddle, my friend,
So much in a moment's course
That ten hundred men will be helpless to mend
By wisdom, patience or force.

But here we may mention a general rule
To be followed by wise men hereafter:
Though there's plentiful reasons to fear a fool,
Remember: a fool fears laughter!

Sergey Mikhalkov
Translated by Dorian Rottenberg

1 I know this is haughty of me, but that's life.  I think this line and the one preceding it are ill-rendered.  I don't know a speck of Russian, so I can't go back to the original to re-work it, but based on the translation and the spirit of the poem, here's my suggestion:

Exceedingly hard to see the fool's face
It is for the keenest of eyes.