to crash on the rocks (poem)

I do not fear the rocks
this ship's hull is full of holes and I sail on
out towards the roughest seas and tempests
so the crashing waves may escort me to the depths
beyond the touch of the light.

There, I will descend into dark familiarity,
that wretched place I had learned to call home
in a life now dead and half-forgotten.
I go in search of something I left behind,
a part of myself whose cries echo through the deep.

Down there, where the whispers are deafening,
I will retrieve a heart broken and crushed
which once desperately chased the lights of the deep
directly into the jaws of unseen horrors.
This time – we will ascend instead.

Reunited and whole for the first time,
I will climb back out of those whispering depths,
their allure now faded and weak to my ears.
I will crash through the waves and greet the sky,
drag the current back to the shore.

Then, you will see that I have changed.
reforged by sky, sea, and flame,
I do not fear the rocks, the abyss, goodbye.
Let this ship full of holes sink out of sight;
I will welcome another horizon.

-Zero