Children of the Sea

Children of the Sea Summary | His Narrative Summary

A young man, who has taken to the sea with a group of fellow refugees from Haiti, writes to his young love that he has had to leave behind. Friends since childhood, the man fears that she will be married off by her father in his absence. He describes his longing for her and asks her to promise not to marry a soldier because he had seen the way their experiences strip them of their humanity.

The young man describes in detail the other passengers on the ship. Most of them are older, but one girl seems to be about his age. She is pregnant. He is thankful that there are not any children on the boat because he feels their eyes would convey the despair each passenger struggles against. He attempts to remember what he can of America and Miami where they hope to land. Floating on the open sea, the passengers do not know how far they have progressed. They think often of death. The young lover remembers the life he left behind, a radio show where he was free to discuss the political state of the country and the future they hoped to create.

As time passes, the passengers on the boat grow seasick and sunburned. The young man describes the plight of another passenger who had previously escaped to Miami with a group of Cubans, only to be returned to Haiti by the Coast Guard. Now, with a broken leg and papers to prove that the Haitian police are after him, he tries a second time to survive the journey. The young lover talks about the women on the boat who sing and cry. He describes the overpowering smell of the sea adding to their nausea. There is little food on board and he fears the pregnant girl will give birth soon. The boat has developed a small crack that they were able to patch with tar. The man describes himself as finally an African now that his skin has darkened in the blazing sun. He tells her about dreaming that he died and went to heaven at the bottom of the sea.

The passengers on the boat tell stories to keep each other and themselves alive. One of the passengers has a radio and sometimes they listen to signals that they pick up from the Bahamas. They discuss how there is much discrimination against Haitians there. The young man confesses to his lover the humiliating aspects of life on the small ship, having to go to the bathroom in front of so many others. He begins to wonder if the sea is endless.

The pregnant girl, Celianne, goes into labor and the young lover moves to the other end of the ship to distance him from the event. More cracks have developed in the boat and been patched. He tells his lover that the food supplies have run out.

Celianne gives birth to a baby girl. The baby does not cry. The boat has continued to take on water and the passengers have to continually offer more of their belongings to the sea to lighten the ship. They name the baby Swiss for the Swiss Army knife used to cut her umbilical cord. The passengers gossip about the circumstances of Celianne's pregnancy. The young man writes about his lover and his fear of her father's disapproval. He mentions how his mother fainted when the boat set sail and how he does not even know if his parents are ok. Baby Swiss still does not cry. The passengers have to take turns bailing water out of the boat.

The young man relates Celianne's story about the baby's father. Swiss does not cry, pressed against her young mother's chest. He says that she cannot bring herself to throw the baby into the ocean. Celianne told him how soldiers broke into her home and held a gun to her brother's head as they forced him to have sex with his mother. Then they tied them up and took turns raping Celianne. When they were finished, they arrested her brother and took him away. She took a razor to her face so that no one would know whom she was. Then she began to swell with pregnancy. She is only 15.

The young man describes how people have volunteered to throw the dead baby into the ocean. Celianne will not. Despite the growing smell, she clings to the child's body. The young man describes to his lover how Celianne threw baby Swiss overboard and watched as she sank and then followed her to the bottom of the ocean. He says that there was no time to save her. The water in the boat has continued to rise. The passengers need to dump the remainder of their possessions. The young man tells his lover that he must throw out the notebook in which he has been writing to her. He talks about how perhaps he too was fated to be a child of the sea and promises his love that he will always remember her.