When I write paradise, I mean not apple trees and only golden women, but also scorpions and tarantulas and flies, rattle snakes, bacteria, bear, cactus, yucca, bladder weed, ocotillo and mesquite, flash floods and quicksand, and yes, disease and the rotting of flesh. Paradise is the here and now, the actual, tangible dogmatically real Earth on which we stand. Yes, God Bless America, the Earth on which we stand.

Edward Abbey