Owed
Rent from DeepDyve- Owed
Go away to get your degree . . .We are not ready for you here (uh Mānoa, 1996)
I went . . .
A Hawaiian on the moku Of a “younger sibling” To write in exile
Dusty lit halls on Symonds Street Red brick, stuffy airs, empirical snobbery
But you…
A familiar spirit in a book-laden office Brown lavalava, English tea, indigenous affinity:
You are in the right placeMāori concerns are not yours
Focus on home
Expand your native voiceProve them wrong
Discard self-doubt
Tell our storyUse their rhetoricChange their presumptions
And so . . . [End Page 271]
I grew roots beyond Hawai‘i Deep into Oceania Feeding me as I returned home To create warriors Armed with mo‘olelo
Monica A. Ka‘imipono Kaiwi is head of the English Department at the Kamehameha Schools, Kapālama, where she teaches Hawaiian, Pacific, and world literatures. She earned her master’s degree in English from the University of Auckland (1998–2001) where, under the supervision of Albert Wendt, she focused on contemporary Hawaiian literature.
Glossary
- moku
-
island, district
- mo‘olelo
-
story, history [End Page 272]
