Lost At Sea Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

Lost At Sea

It was a quiet night when I woke up in the small cabin I shared with
the other deck-boy. The porthole was open and brought a welcoming
cooling breeze and I fell asleep again wondering idly what the other
deck boy was up to. He was missed at eight o’clock by, the time his
watch began, the ship turned around and on the enormous sun sparkly
mirror, we looked for him. We knew this was hopeless but something
had to be written in the ship’s logbook.

His name was Terje, a puny little boy who cried a lot when shouted
at and therefore was an easy target to make fun of by the crew.
His steady masturbation had gone on my nerves, mostly because
he dried his fluid on the curtain that covered each bunk for privacy.
Crew, silent for a few days, feeling guilty for teasing him, I too felt
a nip of guilt I enjoyed having the cabin by myself, when we docked
in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, Terje was all but forgotten.