Goodbye Kauai
Thank you for the good vibes
Don’t know when I’ll get back
Maybe when I lack
The sea air and ocean waves
Cool nights and temperate days
Your green mountains
And supple shores
Your nutritious bounty
And fragrant flowers
We will miss the times we had
Aloha, Mahalo
Our thoughts are glad.
Fire, Fire
Flame and pop
Hula Dancers
Of Kalama
Evocations of
History passed
Through generations
The present cast
The tales of
The Peoples
Born of the Flame
To destinations for
Prosperity gained
From toil and fire
From loss and pain
Fulfill the promise
Of a prophecy named
By wise old father
To the Princess Bride
Face the fears
Past the fire Isle
Unto the promise
The land of plenty
Birthed of water
Resolved in Alchemy
The Garden Island
A golden state
The blue wind’s gift
This green world awakes
No one would ever guess
How many years you have spent
Making this world a better place
3.2 Generations, 8 Decades
3 Children, Now 5…4 Grandchildren
Now grown, who would have known
That this beauty of indeterminable age
Is as wise as a sage
With so many years under her scarf
You can not count them like the larks
Whose happy songs fill the morning air!
And oh, she sings with a voice as sweet
As honeysuckle dew pulled from
Flowery trumpets and rejoices like
A chorus of morning birds who
Awaken the spirit as the golden light
Opens upon a new day. This day,
29,200 days since your birth
Into a world just shaken days before by the
Bombs of Pearl Harbor and the tides of war
To this day where we climb
Up green hills of Waimea and
Celebrate Hawaiian Adventures among the canyons.
To this day where we celebrate you,
Judy Su. Our matron, our mother, our grandmother.
Originator of our generation – Impetus of our growth
Nurturer of tearful eyes and bloodied knees
Who cared and repaired and brought us back to our feet
So that the adventure could go on and
We could be made strong to face the world
That is brightened by your presence
As we enjoy the sunset and listen to the waves
Bringing in the hopes of a new day.
The seasons are changing
The frost is coming
To bring its crystal blanket
And cover the ground with winter
Turning everything brown and
Changing summer’s growth
Into next spring’s compost
It looks as though
It is laying waste
Desolating everything in its path
But with every cycle
Destruction breeds creation
We must not despair
For a withered stalk
Makes food for the next
Wiley buds
Of spring
Your time has passed
What you have to say
Is no longer relevant
You are The Abuser
Whose last punch
Became enlightenment
For The Abused.
All your power has gone out
No longer are you in control.
We have transcended
Your influence and
This is why you
Are afraid!
With each generation
Your hold on the foundation
Has faltered, slipping…
As your last gasp leads
To a flailing, leaves
You falling off the cliff
Of this civilization
Into the cold waters
Of the past
A fossil – like the statues
Of the oppressors that
Have been torn from the
Town square and
Hurled into the abyss.
A watery wasteland
A stone garden
One last monument to your hate…
Now asleep,
Forever!
What is this hole
Where I like to sink?
Dive down deep and
Try not to think!
Unsuccessful, I scream out loud
Into the silence
Of the overwhelming crowd
Is it this country
So full of divides?
Or my internal spirit
Can’t look in my own eyes?
Can’t face myself
In this fractured mirror
Rather run away
Rather disappear…
It never seems to last
This unseemly despair
If I just let it pass
I might even repair
This shattered looking glass
That distorts my view
As I look out the window
Upon the cool morning dew
The sun always rises
Upon a new day
And refreshes my mind
With new words to say
Chaco, Chaco
Pueblo, pueblo
Solar and lunar
Casting shadow
Crossed perfect symmetry
Over generations
Passing down
Great calculations
To one day build
A night full of houses
That track the Sun
As it falls and rises
To follow the Moon
As it waxes and wanes
Over eighteen years
Of coming and goings
Houses full of empty rooms
For ghostly guests
Not even tombs
For no body rests
In the broken vessels
Of offerings made
To the ancestors travels
North to South
Down roads that unravel
After countless miles
Chaco, Chaco
Pueblo, pueblo
The presence of The Peoples
Persists through the morrows
I look up
Into the night sky
Looking back into
The history of the universe
This mystery I see
A thousand stars
And clouds of dust
Presented to me
From long, long ago
And just a fragment
Not even a whole
Arm of the galaxy
For it unfolds
Well beyond the sky
That sits on the horizon
Before my small eye
A dizzying array
In the dark, dark desert
This bright reminder
Of how dark and small
I am
On this ball of dust
And water
Spinning out into an eternity
Of history
With the possibility that
Empires are falling
Before my eyes like
Stars caught in the greater
Gravity of a singularity
Catch me, catch me
Hold me, hold me
Sexy, sexy
“Fuck you”
You can’t hold on
You can’t slow down
Never get what you want
Until you leave this town
“Fuck you”
I thought you were insightful
When I was a young lad
But you’re so damned depressing
Just a phony, quite mad.
“Fuck you”
Fuck yous, everywhere
Can’t wipe it away
And the girls won’t stay
Sweet and pure and fair
“Fuck you”
You’re Holden, you’re holdin’
Holding on
But they’ll all slip by
They’ll all fall down…
Jenny, Jenny
It’s OK
If with the boys
You like to play
Take a roll in the rye
But you can’t stay!
Ignoble afternoon–
A beautiful day full
Of Unproductive adventure
A morning of attempts
Seen successful by
Others all around us
Empty handed we returned
To the road in search of
Vivacious waters
One last stop at
At the end of our journey–
–A great discovery
This riverbed full
Of our treasures
Great swimmers in abundance
And then great luck
A catch, a beauty
Long and strong, shimmering
With its rainbow skin
A triumph for the picture book
–Alas, against the rules
We had taken what we can’t keep
But greed made for bad decisions
And before I had enlightenment
The light went out of its eyes
There was death in the water
A waste of a noble creature
Now fish food — We must listen
To our children, their
Natural moral instincts
Are better than our
Ignoble age.