Children of the Sea

Krik?Krak!

Children of the Sea

Man: Love the woman. 

I wanted you to to dig your fingernails into my skin and drain out all my blood. 

36 other deserting souls. White sheets with bright red spots float as out sail. 

Want, but also respect. You thought I was testing your will but all I wanted was to be near you. 

Do marry a soldier but they are almost not human. 

Woman: chaos, bullets and no daily life. I listened my father’s order to destroy some of you but I hide some. Papa did not hate you as much as you think. Regrets. I do not sketch my butterflies anymore because i do not even like seeing the sun. 

Man: There was a pregnant girl on board. Covered face with scars that look like razor marks. Short and speaks in a singsong that reminds me of the villagers in the north. Looking into young people’s empty faces remind me of the hopelessness of the future in our country. It is hard enough with me. Miami. Not religious, on boat no direction.  I am more comfortable now with the idea of dying. Not I have completely accepted it, but i know that it might happen. I ca not scream at it and tell it to go away. Video show was my whole life. Lots of protestants on this boat. A lot of them see themselves as Job or the children of Israel. 

Women: Army finally did give some bodies back, they told the families to go collect them at the rooms for indigents at the morgue. Mandan Roger, collect her son’s head. Port-au-prince, their live place. I can not sleep I count the bullets in the dark, I keep wondering if it is true, did you really get out. 

Man: First real day at sea. Everyone was vomiting with each small rocking of the boat. One lady fainted from sunstroke. Helped to revive her by rubbing some of the salt water. Day so hot night so cold. At night, I watch the sea, the sky and the sea are one. The stars look so huge and so close, they make for very bright reflections in the sea. At times I feel like I can just reach out and pull a star down from the sky as though it is a breadfruit or a calabash or something that could be of use to us on this journey. Beloved Haiti. Women start crying. Once you have been at sea for a couple of days, it smells like every fish you have ever eaten, i am so tired of the smell. I am also tired of the way the people on this boat are starting to stink. 

Woman: Papa found your tapes, he started yelling at me, asking if I was crazy keeping them, he just waiting for the gasoline ban to be lifted so we can get out of the city. Selfish. Crazy whores. Fight. Wishes one of the macoutes bullets would hit herself. 

Man: Finally an African, darker than your father, Want a lady hat but rejected. I dreamt that I died and went to heaven, this heaven was nothing like I expected. It was at the bottom of the sea. You were with me too. 

Yesterday telling stories. Someone says Krik? You answer Krak. Sometimes it feels like we have been at sea longer than the many years that I have been on this earth. The sun comes up and goes down, this is how you know it has been a whole day. A radio from Bahamas, they treat Haitians like dogs in the Bahamas, a woman says. To them, we are not human. Even though their music sounds like ours, their people look like ours, even though we had the same African fathers who probably crossed these same seas together. Maybe the sea is endless, like my love for you. (I love this line.)

Woman: The soldiers were looking for her son, MR was screaming, you killed him already, we buried his head, you can not kill him twice. She came out and shouted it, I hope your mothers will never rest in their cursed graves. You killed him once already. You want to kill me too? You want to kill me? i do not care anymore, i am dead already. You have already done the worst to me that you can do, you have killed my soul. 

Man: Celianne spent the night groaning, she looks like she has been ready for a while. but maybe the child is being stubborn. The only babies I have ever seen right after birth are baby mice. Veil thin skin, wanted to poke them to see if my finger would go all the way through the skin, move. I am scared to think of what would happen if we had to choose among ourselves who would stay on the boat and who would died. Vultures. Sun will set soon, Everyone will eat their last scraps of food today. 

Woman: Papa said that we are not going to stay in PAP to find out if this is true or if it is lie that president is coming back. Move to safe place. People are just too hopeful, and sometimes hope is the biggest weapon of all to use against us. People will believe anything, they will claim to see the christ return and march on the cross backwards if there is enough hope. 

Man: Celianne had a girl baby, the woman acting as a midwife is holding the baby to the moon and whispering prayers. The baby has not cried. We had to throw our extra things in the sea because the water is beginning to creep in slowly. The boat needs to be lighter. Celianne’s child is a beautiful child, they are calling her Swiss because the word swiss was written on the small knife they used to cut her umbilical cord. If she is my daughter, called her Soleil, Sun, Moon or Star, after the elements. She still hasn’t cried. She was pregnant with a married man, so her parents threw her out. It is only my misfortune that would lump me together with an indigent like you. Swiss is not crying, they keep slapping her behind but she is not crying. 

Woman: Old president did not come, they arrested a lot of people at the airport, shot a whole bunch of them down. I said I love you to my papa. I was capable of loving somebody. 

Man: Celianne is lying with her head against the side of the boat, the baby still will not cry, they both look very peaceful in all this chaos, Celianne is holding her baby tight against he chest. Story from her lips, brother lied down with sex with her mom by order from soldiers.  Mom said listen to soldiers because of afraid. Then soldiers took turn to raping Celianne. Then she cut her face with a razor. 

We got some relief from the seawater coming in, the captain used the last of his tar, and most of the water is staying out for a while. everyone wanted to throw C baby down to the boat but she rejected. C’s fingernails are buried deep in the child’s naked back. 

Woman: Butterflies, no news for him. Banyan tree is the most trusted friend. From the banyan tree, I see the mountains still, so many mountains that are bare like rocks, I feel like all those mountains are pushing me farther and farther away from you. 

Man: She threw the baby overboard. Sink and she jumped in too. She also sink. Sea has no mercy. Water rising again. I hope my parents are alive, i asked the old man to tell them what happened to me. He asked me to write his name in my book, JMANJFOM. Perhaps I was chosen from the beginning of time to live there with Agwe at the bottom of the sea. Maybe this is why I dreamed of the starfish and the mermaids having the Catholics Mass under the sea. Maybe this was my invitation to go. In any case, I know that my memory of you will live even there as I too become a child of the sea. 

Woman: Thank you papa, because you saved my life.he groaned. I began to run and run so it would not land on me. More killing in port. I heard that another boat sank off the coast of the bahamas, I can not think about you being in there in the waves. Behind these mountains are more mountains an more black butterflies still and a sea that is endless like my love for you.