The ‘I’iwi Calling Us Home
Honolulu, HI
2025, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
Firmly rooted in the ‘āina, the land we call home,
the distant cry of the i’iwi echoes through the deep valleys
Its song, a lost melody of longing
as its vibrant red feathers soon dwindle down
to too few.
Hidden behind the ‘ohi’a lehua,
whose blossoms glow like burning embers,
it cries, begging us to remember
what has been
and then
what will no longer be.
The ancient Hawaiians respected the island beneath them,
took careful care of every breathing thing.
Never take more than necessary
or else the kalo you grow will sag and wilt,
heart shaped leaves bent toward the ground
as its sustenance is lost and will not be found.
So they cultivated the soil,
feeding the earth as the earth had fed them.
They chose to respect the environment
and the environment gave back.
At the sea, where waves crash onto steady rocks,
they harvested the fish, but never overfished the docks.
So the fish were always there
they need not whisper a silent prayer.
In the great rolling mountains
where the trees grew a many
they cut down what was needed,
leaving the rest whole and completed.
So that it may grow into a repeated
forest where it always exceeded what they needed.
But in the scream
that pierces through the sky,
it warns of a future.
Where the mangrove runs wild
and dissolved oxygen in the ponds is consumed,
leaving the fish gasping for air, breathless
drowning its own home.
A place where the trees are cut like weeds
and great industries pay no heed
to the life that recedes.
As plumes of soft, white smoke fills the air,
pollutants contaminate the fresh streams,
the water is no longer clear.
Instead it is tainted by the ignorance of those who do not fear
what the islands will be
if we don’t see
that we are doing more harm than good.
What happened to sustainability?
Why have we taken
and taken
and taken
from the land that has given us everything we could have ever asked for?
Give back to the soil the good seed
that you wish to one day see
blossom and grow, it can be free.
We just have to be
more like the ancestors of these islands,
they once held the key.
It just starts with you and me.
Reflection
When I first saw this prompt, I immediately got excited. I think I present a very unique perspective on this as I am from Hawaii and grew up learning about all of the sustainable practices of the ancient Hawaiians in which they cared for their land and their land gave back to them what they needed. One thing in particular was their fishing practices in using loko’ia, or fishponds, which I had done research and experiments on the invasive mangrove’s effect on the welfare of the pond. I wanted to express how they were able to respect their environment in such a way that they thrived. Traditional ecological knowledge holds crucial information in addressing the problems we have created today, and I feel that by remembering and bringing to light the ways of the Hawaiians, we can move forward with a better connection to our ‘āina. Yet contrasted to what Hawaii is like now, I want others to consider factors as to why we are pushed in this direction, and how we can go back to what once was. I choose to voice my thoughts out through poetry because it demonstrates how very few simple words can hold such a powerful message.