TWO

Mauli

 

What is this centre thing that holds me to my life?

This mauli the cool Manoa evening makes me contemplate?

 

Is it like the thin sliver of light I will remember

after the last sunset slips off the Ko’olau?

Is it like the just-there acidy taste of anti-cholesterol

that promises a life after death without fat?

Is it like the owl’s sonar flight in the fearless dark

though it doesn’t know it is flying?

Is it like the desire of grass to be lush and succulent in the Manoa rains?

Or the compulsive search by water always for its apt shape?

Is it some thing you can crawl out off and bequeath

to another creature which needs a shell from predators?

Is it the memory of the sea womb out of which you surfaced

into the despair of the light?

Is it an invisible second skeleton of bone

your grandchildren will wear like a uniform?

Can you smoke it like pakalolo and talk the air

into giving up its secret elixirs? And is it 10 dollars a joint?

Can you smell it? And if you can what does it smell like?

Is it the blood odour of the amniotic tide that cauled you?

Or that of hot porridge on a freezing morning at boarding school?

Frangipani? Moso’oi? Roses?

Or fresh bread as the morning opens your house?

What about the stench of unwashed feet?

Or an aunt’s noiseless fart as she pretends all is well with her life?

If you can touch it what do you prefer it to feel like?

The long slick clinging feel of the black Vaipe mud

out of which you have eased?

What about the whole weave of your lover’s skin as you burn?

Or the searching feel of your father’s Sunday sermon at Malie

that woke you to the mana of words?

Or the stinging bite of your grandmother’s salu on your legs?

What about the large embrace of her arms afterwards?

 

Or if you can taste it would it taste

like a hotdog with mustard onions and a lot of hope?

A double cheeseburger with a lot of hope

but without onions and mustard?

Pork sapasui oka fa’alifu kalo palusami koko alaisa or fries?

 

What about the taste of marmite or weetbix? (I bet only Kiwis know those!)

Or the taste of hot fish ‘n’ chips on a Friday night in Ponsonby?

 

Yes this centre thing that holds even river stones to their shape and shine

that holds the owl aloft in the dark as it targets the hunger in its stride

that is the rage and sparkle in my grandchildren’s eyes

holds me true and upright to the path of my life

I did not buy or ask for it

It came with me and won’t let me forget it

until it runs out

 

MAUALAIVAO ALBERT WENDT