Romantic Naturalist

Heaven is a romance;
Align it with the soul
And life shall be good.
The flesh of man---
The naturalist in me---
Sees every failure
Underneath every 
Forbidden rock.
Pick up the rock---
As Cain had---and the earth itself
Becomes a stone.
Pleasant natural highs
Intonate the Romantic's
View on life.
Live in the high...

Yet, true love is found
In some who feel little.
So cruelty is found
In some with the opiate of infatuation.
Sobriety can make one right;
Pleasures can cause harm.

But, to know love...
To have felt it... or true joy
And have it snuffed out by one
Whose pain is caused by another's pleasure...
It tethers me to reality.
I understand it both ways.

The Naturalist is not evil;
Nor the Romantic good.
My virtue is not a warped portrait
Nor is it self medication.
I know the opium of love
That it is true.

Yet those who call it aught a drug
Are addicts who will shirk anyone to obtain a fix.