Artichoke & Other Poems

Artichoke & Other Poems
University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, Hawaii
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Roughly half of the poems in this first collection, generally conventional in form, treat recognizably Hawaiian subjects-a burial
cave, cane fields, the Royal Hawaiian, Maui, banana palms. Several of the poems are influenced by the poet's background in the classics-Hesiod, Dante, the Bible. Others are less readily categorized.

Excerpt From Artichoke & Other Poems

Artichoke
                        When the artichoke blooms....
                                        Hesiod, Works and Days, 582
Praise love
and praise the tast of love
and raise
the thorny-pointed artichoke
coned on a prickly needled core
and tough as the gut of love.
Pour the sea-dark wine unmixed.
Pull off
the leaves
of the jagged leather
                                artichoke
from around a stiffly thickened stem.
O praise the taste
of love between the teeth.
Go garlanded with parsley,
go celery crowned to feast.
Then eat the coarse, delicious
heart of the horn
the artichoke.