HIIAKA STARTS ON HER JOURNEY
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Emerson, Nathaniel Bright
Pele did not know this name-song of Lohiau until she heard it recited by Hiiaka. This it was that led Hiiaka to come back within easy hearing distance:
Ke uwá ia mai la e ka ua;
Ke kahe ia mai la e ka wai:
Na lehua i Wai-a’ama, la, lilo,
Lilo a’u opala lehua
I kai o Pi’i-honua, la;
Mai Po’i-honua no a Pi’i-lani.
TRANSLATION
It sobs in the rain;
It moans in the rushing tide.
Gone is my grove of lehuas—
My rubbish grove, that stood
By the pilfering waters—flown,
He has flown, like its smoke, to heaven.
’Tis there I must seek him!
“How absurd of you,” said Pele; “you were not sent on an expedition to heaven, but to bring a man who is here on earth. If you fly up to heaven, you will pass him by and leave him here below.”
Hiiaka and her faithful companion—Pau-o-pala’e—had gotten well away from the vast pit of Kilauea, with its fringe of steam-cracks and fumaroles that radiate from it like the stays of a spider-web, and they were nearing the borders of Pana-ewa, when Hiiaka’s quick ear caught the sound of a squealing pig. Her ready intuition furnished the right interpretation to this seemingly insignificant occurrence:
A loko au o Pana-ewa,
Halawai me ka pua’a
A Wahine-oma’o,
Me ku’u maka lehua i uka.
Me ka Malu-ko’i3 i ka nahele,
E uwé ana i ka laau.
Alalá ka pua’a a ka wahine—
He pua’a kanaenae,
He kanaenae mohai ola—
E ola ia Pele,
I ka Wahine o ka Lua, e-e!
TRANSLATION
In the heart of Pana-ewa—
Lehuas were heavy with bud,
The dim aisles solemn with shadow—
I met with a suckling pig,
The pet of Wahine-oma’o,
A wailing voice in the wilderness:
’Twas the creature wail of the thing,
Foredoomed as an offering, this
Wailing thing was a sacrifice,
An appeal to Pele for life,
To the Woman who dwells in the Pit.