THREE HAWAIIAN POEMS
THE PIGEONS ON THE BEACH
White like tapa, like the tapa that goes on the staffs of Kings is the beach beside the two-hued Pacific.
Pigeons come down to the beach; they run along taking grains of the coral sand into their crop. They rise up; they fly, they hang above the reef that the surf foams across.
And beyond is the Ocean. They sway a little way above it. Then they come back across the reef that takes the foam. They run along the beach taking sands into their crops, pigeons that have come down from the dove-cotes behind the orchards.
A wave-break startles them where they run. They rise up. And now they see the dove-cotes beyond the orchards and they are gathered to them.
But in the dove-cotes all night they will hear the surf breaking, and they will dream of strong mates and craggy breeding-places and powerful flights that will win to them.
And at daybreak they will go to the beach; they will run along taking sands into their crops; they will rise up and they will fly; they will hang above where the reef gathers the foam.
A little while only they will hang above it; a little way only they will sway beyond it; they will come back and take sand into their crops. And as they run along the beach they will not know that the plover and the sand-piper have departed, flying through brightness and through darkness until they find for themselves the atolls and the craggy islets around which ranges the eight-finned shark.
Pigeons that have come down to the beach beside the two-hued Pacific!
