Ta'e mahino

Here's a poem for Tongan Language Week. It is part of a series of verse letters that I wrote to my mate Sio Siasau when he was living and painting in Gotham City last year.

When I turned up to Pah Homestead to give a talk about Sio's art a couple of weeks ago, I attempted to give a Tongan greeting my audience, and was embarrassed to realise how much of the language I'd forgotten. The great Peter Ackroyd said that he cam assimilate masses of information when he's working on a book, but that much of it slips out of his head when he moves on to a another project. Can I claim the same failing?

Sonnet for Sio: 18

Your language is a portable homeland, Sio.
Inside my local Free Wesleyan Church
men must wear beaten bark around their waists,
dresses must waft safely around women's ankles,
and each deacon must carry a white handkerchief
in case the deacon's brow needs drying
halfway through his sermon. No word may begin
or end without a vowel, and choriesters must lift their voices
for the first syllables of 'uma and 'ata
so that no one may mistake a shoulder for a kiss,
or twilight for freedom. We repeat the prayer
to 'Otua, that god who demands
a glottal stop. Last night I dreamed
that I was on my knees, inspecting
the goddess Hikule'o's dress,
lifting its hem as carefully as an umu stone,
and sniffing gratefully
as an air conditioner's breeze blew down on my brow.

[Posted by Scott Hamilton]