Artifact Title: Sea is History

Medium: Text

Author: Derek Walcott

Poem Title: The Sea is History

Publisher: The Paris Review, Issue 74

Year: Fall-Winter 1978

Image Credit: Photo of Paris Review by Judith Brunton

TERA Curator: Alejandro Escalante

Sea is History

That which we do and that which we leave undone, eventually ends up in the sea. From the ships that left port in Ouidah, Benin, never to reach the shores across the Atlantic, to the microplastics that now line the stomachs of the food we consume, the ocean contains our histories. And with rising sea levels, the sea will soon contain our present, too. In the all-consuming abyss of the ocean, though, Walcott sees potential—a beginning.