Sue Cowing (2012 Poem In Your Pocket)



Where I’m From

by Diane

I am from rotary phones,
Best Foods and Aloha Shoyu.

I am from the hardwood floor.

I am from the gardenia bushes,
the pink and yellow plumeria.

I am from kanekapila
and loud laughter.

From Montgamory,
and Haʻo
and Leisner.

I am from warm hugs
and loving kisses.
From “you too friendly”
and “blood comes first.”

I am from catechism.
I’m from Hawaiian/German/Chinese
and beef stew and raw fish.

From Grandma’s music, the ukulele,
and the sound of her voice.
I am from a wooden house,
bunk beds, and crowded tables.

This poem was published in the Hawaiʻi Review Editor's Blog as part of an e-chapbook entitled WHEA YOU FROM…WHEA YOU GOING, which was produced by the residents of TJ Mahoney & Associates, a community reentry program in Honolulu.

Diane is from a family of eight. "Where I'm From" is the first poem she has ever written. She wrote it when she took a creative writing class at Ka Hale Hōala Hou No Nā Wahine, a residential transitional facility for women making the successful transition from prison back to our communities. She also learned how to be comfortable speaking in front of people through the class. Her dream is to be happy.

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Birthday

by Sue Cowing

A poem is a baby slowly forming
in the fluid inner world:
toes out of nowhere,
eyelashes out of heartbeat.
Like a dolphin, born tail-first
so it won’t drown
in a world of water.
Then someone, is it the mother?
nudges it to the surface, crooning
breathe now, breathe.
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Kōnane

by Sue Cowing

At Kaʻena, fire and waterline up their stones

 

dull black lavaround white coral

 

for the island’s oldest kōnane gamemoves so slow

 

the stones are all we see.

 

Sue Cowing is a local author active in the Hawaiʻi literary community. Her latest work is a middle-grade novel You Will Call Me Drog. Birthday was originally published in Bamboo Ridge.

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