Post Sad (Ptsd) Poem by Dave SmithWhite

I saw a bleeding sunset,
Sink into the sea.
The troubled waters boiling,
As if in sympathy.
The vessel's ribs were groaning,
I heard a violent crack.
The mast began to topple,
With it's rigging, limp and slack.

The captain barked an order,
That we must hit the deck.
The reef had appeared from nowhere,
To claim another wreck.
Yet we just stood there, frozen.
It staggered our belief.
Why had the fates so chosen,
To bring us all to grief?

The schooner yawed and shuddered,
As the coral ripped through the hull.
It sank in fewer seconds,
Than it took to light my mull.
With a sudden thrust beneath the brine,
My mind was shocked and dull.
I resurfaced in the nick of time,
To hear the shrieking gulls.

I looked around, saw no-one,
But heard those damned birds screech.
The ketch had flipped and foundered,
With it's wretched structure breached.
The crew had let out a stifled sound,
As we floundered, each.
And I wondered if all were drowned,
As I swam for the receding beach.

Of course, that was the moment,
That even old sea-dogs can't teach.
You can't prepare for torment,
When to the gods you plead, beseech
To intervene on your behalf,
And save you from your doom.
While the blasted fowl mock and laugh,
As your grimmer ending looms.

So pitched into the foaming sea,
I made the rocky shore.
And struggled from it's clutches free
To truck with hope once more.
But survival is a greasy slope,
I grapple to this day.
Will I move on? Will I cope?
In truth I cannot say.

Some live with an abiding guilt,
While others slip away.
Some with senses loosed to tilt,
When revival goes astray.
Some devolve to the noose and rope,
As on their knees they pray.
But I resolve not to wilt or mope,
In life's evolving play!