Hawai‘i Literature & Art
— Since 1978 —
“The whole damn thing about God, if He exists,” I say to Mardi, rudely pointing my Lone Star longneck, “is that, if He exists, we need to take that into consideration in the way we live our lives. Consider, for example, how we conduct business and government and parenting and relationships with each other. What…
Looking at my naked self in a full-length mirror reveals a diverse palette of possibilities, some anticipated, some not. It seems that by choosing sudden baldness over the more gradual male pattern alternative, I have opened up other coiffure possibilities. In fact, invited them. Nay, demanded them. Judging by the preliminary stubble, I will have…
ON HE RODE — Chapter Thirty-Six The truth is, I don’t take offense easily. Cleverness and subtlety, even sarcasm and irony, are mostly wasted on me. I can get too tangled up in trying to make sense out of what just happened to be offended by it — or even to know if offense was…
Boy and Uncle: China virus –Boy, da news say dey attacking people in Chinatown. Telling dem “Go home! Go back to where you came from!” –Dey tink dey went bring da corona virus from China. –Dat no make sense. Most of dose guys nevah been to China fo fifty years. –You no remembah? President Trump…
Was it three years ago or four when I thumbed my way across the country’s biggest state, the beginning of an adventure that has taken me up and down the Coast, over to Hawaii, then Europe, then Hawaii, now here, the second-biggest state? Four, I think. A lot of stops along the way. Not a…
A string of Mauna. Regal morning silhouettes awaken to snow.
“Need help?” I inquire through my open shotgun window. The family assumes a defensive posture that has Daddy holding a jack handle at the back of the car, Junior crouching unarmed behind him, Mama looking stern behind Junior, and Sis leaning on the right front fender behind Mama. “Flat tahr,” Daddy answers. “Bad luck,” I…
She lifts her left foot slowly, moving forward Steadily, if only by six inches. This Is how she gets to Foodland every Thursday, Senior discount day. She is as tiny as the gray weeds growing Along the curb. I fear even a light wind Will nudge her off balance, yet her steps are sure,…
He paid for one night with his last twenty hidden away in his otherwise empty wallet the gallon of cheap red weighed heavily in the brown paper bag, stuck between a dog-eared copy of Edgar Allan Poe’s Tamerlane and Other Poems by a Bostonian one of only 50 copies printed long ago he had found…
One thing about owning an old car is that it gives you a good excuse to spend hours poking around wrecking yards, archaeological sites of great interest and value as repositories of automotive truth. Having just excised two adjectives from that sentence, I’m wondering whether to put them back in and whether I should find…