A Sea Dream

A Sea Dream starts with the principle character, Mikey, half waking with a dream about him being a pig in a pig sty trying to jump a fence but failing though luckily finding a carrot before the other pigs see it. He awakes next to his lady but doesn’t really recognise her nor his own body as she is a Black woman and he finds that he is a Black man, not the White man he was assuming he was.

They go to a movie across the street from a barbeque shop that he identifies with and longs for being over there with the boys. In the movie, old Black comedies, the presence of policemen who stop the film and ordering people out causes fights and Mikey finds himself almost beating a man to death who was trying to steal his wallet after hitting him with a brick. Mikey starts crying and while being soothed by his woman he remembers his grand mother, Big Mama, who had died and he falls into more remorse.

He is awakened by a skinny shipmate who tells him that he was afraid to wake him in the fighting and crying dream state he was in. Mikey sees that he is White like he thought.