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NA NOKE
Weaved together by rims of fresh coconut-leaflet We call it a fire fountain bag An immeasurable depth Bubu’s voice, a mixture of delight and pride As she lovingly gifts to me my first home work (pun intended) Like hot-stones, I felt the heat of every word flowing from her "Na noke, the earth's bread Na noke, the oyster's bed Na noke, the resting place for our head" Her soft voice and wrinkled smile enveloped with directions Mo lai ca-buka, Mo lai canuma mai na sasalu ni Waitui Mo lai vili niu I watched her bubu hands carry the noke for decades She gently straps it on me, Beautiful kesa designs printed on the sides Memories-of and memories-from and a proverb guide “the largeness of we in a tide is stronger than a tide in a we” Like a basin, our noke, a storage for firewood, raw fish and family Her pale grey hair and sleepy eyes laid to rest. Bubu, Our noke is heavy on my back The fire fountain that keeps us warm Is at war with the flame burning our feet An unwelcome burst An exhibition of forced injection Wrapped in disconnection and deception Dressed up as “special operations for human protection” Bubu would say, We look back to look forward Our noke, A home for living creation and their generations A combination of determination and willful migration |
A bit of context to the poem.
The noke to me was part of my existence; it's impossible for me to see a noke as separate from the ocean, land and the community because we all played a role and I saw this role as reciprocal. It's called a seafood basket but the extent of its role is more than its name and so I feel the same way about the ocean and land and its resources. When we think of the military exercise in Hawaii and its impact - it's more than Hawaii that's affected, it's more than the shared ocean, it's more than the shared cultural values and traditional knowledge. It's everything in and around us that's affected. The magnitude of erasure that's happening in our society is beyond what we see on the surface. |
