Andrew's View of the Week

I Must Go to the Sea

The machine has stopped.
The beams no longer batter the body.
The doctor has proclaimed
all is well.

Breathing in the fresh air
brings no relief
mind weighed down
with the weight of doubt.

There should be joy in this moment
There should be freedom in the wind
There should be …

But it won’t leave
That ghost, that specter
That word
That fear of return.

Happiness so far away
as far as the sea
Ship wrecked and marooned
The soul fights for survival

But the mind bends unwillingly to inaction
To hide
To wait
To long for rescue

Repair the ship
Run on the flowing tide
Once more to the power of the sea
and leave marooned that word,
that cancer.

This is one of the poems I wrote for my poetry book and wanted to share it with you.  I am over half way done on my writing project.  So far I’ve written 24 poems plus some other stuff.  There are 14 poems left on my list to write.

The prompt for this poem was, ‘depression after treatment.’  According to my doctor about 80 percent of all post treatment cancer patients get some form of depression (from mild to clinical).  The other inspiration was John Masefield’s poem, Sea Fever.  I expect many of you will know the first two lines:
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;

It’s a poem I often think of in moments when my strength is ebbing and I need a bit of a boost – there is a power in the sea, a power to heal, a power to strengthen and a power to lift us out of ourselves.
Till next week,
Andrew