I am in anguish. For the first time, I feel homeless in America

I BEGAN election night writing a column that started with words from an immigrant, my friend Lesley Goldwasser, who came to America from Zimbabwe in the 1980s. Surveying our political scene a few years ago, Lesley remarked to me: "You Americans kick around your country like it's a football. But it's not a football. It's a Fabergé egg. You can break it."

With Donald Trump now poised to take the presidency, I have more fear than I've ever had in my 63 years that we could do just that - break our country, that we could become so irreparably divided that our national government will not function. From the moment Mr Trump emerged as a candidate, I've taken seriously the possibility that he could win; this column never predicted otherwise, although it certainly wished for it. That doesn't mean the reality of it is not shocking to me.

As much as I knew that it was a possibility, the stark fact that a majority of Americans wanted radical, disruptive change so badly and simply did not care who the change agent was, what sort of role model he could be for our children, whether he really had any ability to execute on his plan - or even really had a plan to execute on - is profoundly disturbing.