HIIAKA VISITS PELE-ULA AT KOU—THE HULA KILU
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Emerson, Nathaniel Bright
One’s body is torn—a network of marks.
Climbing the walls of Na-pali, the scent
Of lau-a’e pelts the sense; then fall
The petals sweet, to drown their pain
In the ocean that rages below.
The kilu spins on its way—it must hit—no, fate is too strong for it and turns it from the mark. Lohiau’s song is an admission of painful discomfiture:
O ka eha a ke aloha ke lalawe nei,
Eia la iloko, i ku’u manawa.
Ka eha e! auwe ho’i e!
TRANSLATION
The smart of love o’erwhelms me;
It rages in heart and mind—
This hurt, ah, this hurt!
That Lohiau of all men standing on Hawaiian soil should fail utterly in a game of kilu was incredible—the man whose art availed to hit a grass-top teetering in the breeze, to crush the nimble ant speeding on his way, to swat the buzzing fly flitting through the air! The audience was dumbfounded. In the failure to find excuse sufficient for the occasion, it took refuge in silence.
It only remains for Hiiaka to pluck the fruit which her skill has put within reach of her hand. Her complete victory has become a foregone conclusion. Of that there can be no question. It is, however, a question of great interest to the spectator how she will use her victory, in what terms she will celebrate her triumph over the woman and the recreant man who have combined their wits against hers. The answer to this question is to be found in the song with which she preludes her last play:
Mehameha, kanaka-ole, ka ho’i
O Pu’u o Moe-awa,28 e-e!
Ko ke auhe’e i ka aina kanaka-ole!
TRANSLATION
Aye, lonely, man-empty, indeed;
Cold the couch and bitter the dreams
From which has been exiled the man!
This ironical thrust is pointed at Pele-ula, who is to see her fond hopes of a renewed liaison with her old paramour blasted by this plucking of the fruit under her very eyes.
And yet again, when Hiiaka has made the final shot that fulfills the promise of victory to her, still relentlessly wielding the sharp blade of irony, she gives it an extra twist in the wound that must have made Pele-ula wince:
A kulou anei, e uwé ana—
E uwé no anei, he keiki makua-ole?
Aohe makua; uwé ho’i e!
TRANSLATION
Will the orphan now hang his head
And weep like a motherless child?
His mother is dead; let him weep!
This two-edged blade cuts both lovers at one stroke—the youth in its ironical allusion to tears, the woman in the sly suggestion of motherhood, she being in fact old enough to hold that relation to the young man.
The forfeit paid by Lohiau after his defeat was a dance, which he did with inimitable grace and aplomb to the accompaniment of a spirited song, his costume being the customary paü of the hula:
Ku’u hoa i ka ili hau o Maná,
I kula’i ’na e ka wai o Hina;
Hina ke oho o ka hala,
Ka oka’i pua o ka hinalo i ka wai, e.
Eia oe; he waiwai nui kau,
Ka ke aloha, ina i ona
Ka mana’o mai e: eia oe e.