by Dr. Edward J. Kame`enui
My Hawaiian blood is from Hilo,
the Waipio Valley, and Kamuela
where gobo grows vertical
in soft brown dirt.
Not Lahaina.
Papa Edward, Honolulu fireman,
was a sculpted warrior
in body and face,
with smooth black skin
like his older brother, my Dad,
an electrical lineman.
Both lived fire
both old Hawaii pure.
When the fire
swallowed Lahaina whole,
you could not see
the screaming,
you could not hear
the old warriors rushing
into the new wind,
their teeth smashed
into the back of their heads
to lead the sorrow
that only old fire knows.
Lahaina, all Hawaiian,
dead cane and ashes,
now waits for lava rocks
to cool the new heiau,
where old fire will bury itself and
wait for the new wind to call.
Dr. Edward J. Kame`enui is a native Hawaiian and first-generation college graduate. For almost forty years, he was a university professor and taught at the University of Montana, Purdue University, and University of Oregon, where he retired in 2018. Dr. Kame`enui was a special education teacher and houseparent at a residential treatment center for children identified with serious emotional and learning problems in Wisconsin prior to attaining his Ph. D. at the University of Oregon in 1980. He published his first poem in 1970.
Hawaii Pacific Review 