God created idealism,
Produced visions and perceptions
of beauty, form and inspiration,
To cherish a high purpose for things
as they might or should ever be.
He also created pragmatism,
A capacity to deal with human values,
when there's need to stress criteria,
To offer practical results beyond theory
that subtends reality amidst epic dreams.
Without the one, life would be drab,
yet hypothetically perfect;
Without the other, there's no life substance,
no models of excellence beyond reverie.
Together, how delightful the senses!
How intense the pleasure of the soul!
But there must be space betwixt,
Keeping Utopia at short half-life,
And real-time reflecting objective essence.
~ Robert E.L. Nesbitt, Jr.
Many say civilized society creates in man
the qualities of aristocratic savages,
Encourages war zones between idealists and materialists,
while flaunting reason in emotional ravages,
Favoring experience over instinctive behaviors,
skyscraper heaven over natural romanticism,
Struggling for liberty between many vying factions,
self and sensibilities left numb by rationalism.
Sects ofttimes born of revolutionary passion
in dreams and fury fomenting battle cries,
Kindle the echoes of eighteenth century revolts,
hating city injustices that corruption implies,
But instinctively, or by experience, I'm no in-betweener,
I reason and rationalize, welcome romanticism,
I dream like an idealist and reason like a materialist,
And love freedom yet suffer no passionate fanaticism.
I appreciate nature's grandeur, but I love the city,
I'm at peace in its war zone; I love its confetti.
I'm certainly not an iconoclast,
I only seek truths my soul will clasp.
~ Robert E.L. Nesbitt, Jr.
(Christmas 1999)
Robert E.L. Nesbitt, Jr. has previously appeared in FP.
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