Henry's First Time Poem by Douglas Scotney

A sea-biscuit is a last-resort
and a tooth-crack,
and another name for one
is a hardtack. Right?

The winds had been light,
not at all,
or worse,
in the teeth, and requiring hard tack.

By the sixth day on the Bay of Biscay,
there was no bread
and all he could eat that was left
was old duck and fowl.

The sea-biscuit,
called 'hardtack' for the worse wind connection,
he couldn't chew for bad teeth,
or too few in his head.

For the first time in his life,
fowlful Henry knew
what it was like
to want a bit of bread.