Firm

I've been shifted
Like a baby born on a ship
Who's known nothing else
'Sides the ever-shifting tide
Choked with seaweed
And left melting into spiteful, swollen breakers
Clammy with the sweat of depression
Stamping prints into the sand
Where foam erased my traces

I saw isolation make the weathered sick
And I, not weathered, thought of death
Disheartened by the loss of joy in those I had called strong
But self-pity totes remorse
And there is no excuse

I tasted with the tang of brine, a ceaseless golden beckoning
Mirth that crushed with fullness
And that simmered at the brim
The sullen cringed in cowardice
Afraid to sip its light
And I stood choking at the fork
Without the bliss of ignorance
But the very knowledge that stole my breath
Turned to set me free
Joy is not circumstance, no, it is a choice
And depression selfish in its nature of prudish misery

And so I had to choose between the old and unfamiliar
But One Whose love was greater
Beckoned me to joy
At last the swaying ceased
And anchored firm I stood
Fearing not the coming or the going or the gone