Poems by Wendi White
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Losing Waikiki
by Wendi White
From Canary Summer 2024
Wendi writes on the brow of Wa'ahila Ridge on the island of 'Oahu in the ahupua'a (land division) of Waikīkī along the musical waters of Mānoa stream.
It's a three-seal morning
at our beach where I swim,
and instead of stroking
I'm stringing a rope
across sand hoping
it will stand the day's
pressing crowds.
If you can't hold space
by your self, it must
be held by others,
as a mother cradles
a babe or a reef sets
steps for waves to climb.
But why cede half our shores
to creatures of another kind?
We need what’s left of Waikīkī
for towels and tents.
Our hammocks must swing
on palms we think we own.
Why retreat, why share
what little remains
of this fantasy island?
I swore this when Maui burned,
when the sun’s iron scorched
the land to rid her of our wrinkle,
reducing a thousand years
of human history to ash:
If all I can do is make way
for pinnipeds to molt, mate
and pup another season,
then I will grow old in that effort.
© Wendi White
The Turn of the Snail
What happens if we create an ark where
the passengers can never get off? -Thom Van Dooren
by Wendi White
From Canary Summer 2024
The land whispers stories,
for centuries has sung
in the key of auger shaped snails,
Kāhuli, who once performed
a seemingly ceaseless vine of song,
fugue of leaf-glide and decay-sort
that led to sprouting.
Mākua valley opens its mouth
giving the people words, utters
wind that scours cliffs, hums
with birdcall, proclaims
with winter’s waters:
the forest is life.
Do not disturb
the gods’ village.
Once tree snails tipped each bough
like Kukui nut clusters, now
only a few kinds remain,
some trapped in a box, hidden from us,
and if we don’t look inside, they may
be there forever, but if we peek,
we’ll see that many have no mates.
They wait for us to learn how to return
the forests to their home. They wait
for us to help them sing again.
© Wendi White