In Defense Of The Bitter Poem by Leland D'Elormie

The bitter have been called unpleasant,
Hateful, morbid and unkind,
And yet it is because they lived,
That death is always on their mind.

For in loving life so fiercely,
Heavily did they invest,
And so completely shatter,
That weak organ pounding in the breast.

Metallic did they make their hearts,
Recast in iron, gray and cold,
And it is just this kind of heart,
That fears supremely growing old.

It is because the bitter man,
Once kissed a lover's tender face,
That he will not but spit on those,
Who offer him a warm embrace.

It is because he laughed with friends,
And merrily danced in midnight fields,
That he is now a fortress clad,
In stern and stark and solid steel.

It is because he mischievous was,
With giddy glee and played the fool,
That now he loves propriety,
And lives to follow every rule.

But even these the rules he holds,
He mocks; the law, the code, the books,
What more can be expected,
From the man whom justice overlooks?

The world says he must overcome,
His sorrow, heal and love again,
And this the self-same heartless world,
That spurns, abandons and condemns.

You too would be inclined to think,
That bitter men are morally lame?
You of that merciless, monstrous class,
That has no pity and knows no shame?

It is because he loyal was,
Undyingly, with faith like stone,
That he cannot find faith enough,
To call a single thing his own.

The world looks on the bitter man,
And wonders what is wrong with him,
But never ever thinks to ask,
What made the bitter man so grim.

What filled his heart with misery?
What filled his house with awful tombs,
Which constitute the living corpse,
Of happier days and brighter rooms?

So of the morbid, bitter men,
The world has washed its guilty hands,
It calls them base and brutal; it should know,
That's all it understands.