Ryan Oishi

Ode to the Humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa

I.
I once had a student
who was obsessed with the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa.

Each week,
Kahiolo Rees bent my good-willed prompts
to the shape
of his peculiar inspiration.

“The humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa is fearfully
and wonderfully made”
began his
first composition,
an unusual start to the prompt:
“Tell me about yourself…”

The second composition,
on the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s second spine,
revealed the author’s
truly sophomoric intent—
to include the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s name
as often as humanly possible.
I sighed at the brazen display
of laziness—
a crude gambit to outwit my one-page requirement.
Imagine, every sentence brimming with humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa, swimming in the convoluted reef
of his syntax—
schools of humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa locking their stubborn, twelve-syllable bodies
in the coral crevice of every sentence.
Pronouns were banished.
Appositive phrases,
always containing the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s prodigious name,
were grafted everywhere.

The third composition,
concerning the etymology
of the fish’s name,
contained twice as many references
and simmered with the heat of Kahiolo’s tumultuous thoughts.
I crossed out the flourishing school one by one,
stripping away every extraneous element
until all that remained
was the marrow
of a single unblemished thought:
...humuhumu=triggerfish,
...nukunuku=snout,
...āpuaʻa=like a pig.

Kahiolo was unrepentant.
His fourth composition,
a soliloquy on the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s
brilliant blue teeth,
contained a long, labyrinthine digression
on Harald Bluetooth,
the ancient Viking king
who bestowed
both rune and legacy
upon the language
of our fixed and mobile devices.
With half a page remaining,
gasping for air, like a fish out of water,
he began a prolonged meditation
on the absence of “blue”
in the Hawaiian language—
the closest being uli,
which in reality could mean any dark color—
the black-and-blue of a bruise,
or the dark blue of the sea.
To my surprise,
it also contained an oblique reference
to Homer’s “wine-dark sea”
(a veiled allusion to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis,
the limits of our finite linguistic being).

And so it went,
each composition going from air to air,
a delirious attempt
to include the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s name
as often as humanly possible.

II.
Some compositions were tinged
with a more melancholy air:
a visceral, technical piece,
for example,
describing a new chess opening called “The Humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa”.
It was named after the fish’s infamously
tough skin,
involved the asymmetric sacrifice
of the g7 pawn,
an inexplicable, almost reckless exchange of queens.
The goal, it seemed,
was to build an impenetrable fortress
around the king.
I was told by the school counselor, a good friend,
that it was a variation of the Sicilian,
a reflection, perhaps, of Kahiolo’s combative personality.

His compositions about Kamapuaʻa,
after reading Kame‘eleihiwa’s translation,
were equally somber.
The pig-god’s heroic feats were rarely mentioned;
only the inauspicious birth,
a humble cord tossed into a wine-colored sea—
the fiery love affair,
the harrowing escape,
transformed into a god-fearing humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa.

It was during this Blue Period
that I learned of Kahiolo’s
origin story.
April is the cruelest month, lamented the school counselor
(he secretly fancied himself an English teacher).
He noted the maudlin sea
while we played a game of chess,
an oblique reference, he believed,
to Kahiolo’s mother.
He lives with his grandmother now in Kahaluʻu.
His father’s mostly absent.
He travels the globe taking pictures for National Geographic,
chasing women,
the most recent natural disaster.

I took his g7 pawn.
We exchanged queens.

I met him once,
after the Lahaina fire:
he had an alaniho of stunning blue teeth
tattooed from thigh to achilles.

He castled his king.
The fortress was now complete.
That bastard, my friend, had used Kahiolo’s opening.

I resented his knack
for sanctimonious answers.

Look, he said,
pointing back to Kahiolo’s first composition.
His tone was pregnant with the secret knowledge
only school counselors are privy.
I re-read the composition I had read a hundred times,
tried to decipher the perishable, pearl of truth
hidden in that haunting, feral memory:
Once more, Kahiolo was dancing.
It was his first May Day
at Kaʻaʻawa Elementary.
He is kaholo-ing from side-to-side, smiling,
searching with uncertain eyes the reef of seated parents
as “Little Grass Shack” blares from a pair of mounted speakers
decorated to resemble kāhili.
At last, he finds his parents.
beaming with pride.
Kahiolo’s adolescent palms touch in prayer,
purified into the shape
of a humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa.

It’s the last time he saw his father.

Across the narrow highway,
the Pacific ocean glistens,
full of invisible humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa.

It was then that the puerile project
blossomed with ontological meaning.
“The humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa is fearfully
and wonderfully made,” I repeated.

III.
On May 1st my heart broke
when Kahiolo submitted a one-page report
on the lauwiliwilinukunukuʻoiʻoi.

IV.
For a week, he was absent.
I feared some invisible, blue-black disaster.
Is he okay? I asked the school counselor.
My voice was trembling and desperate.
He gave a vague reply,
something to do with his father.

When Kahiolo returned, he brooded.
His bluish-green eyes wandered,
just slightly unaligned:
the left, pointing towards a distant past,
the right, drifting towards
an auspicious, right-facing future.

To my relief,
his desire to immortalize the peerless fish
returned slowly, full of hesitation:
first, as an acrostic poem,
a cherished memory fishing with his father
(I was pleased to find it myself: the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s name hidden
in the second spine
of perpendicular letters).

A week later, it took the form of a persuasive letter:
Dear Alan Wong, Sam Choy, Mark Noguchi, et. al...
It implored Hawaiʻi’s top chefs
to use the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa
in their Hawaiʻi Regional Cuisine
(he suggested making it the star ingredient in a local version
of Culinary Class Wars).

I breathed a sigh of relief,
contrite, yet hopeful.
I searched for words
the color of uli.

Instead, I noticed Kahiolo’s thoughts turning outwards,
turning towards a larger,
more elusive mythology.
Perhaps that too was a defense mechanism—
a sacrifice, like how ancient kahuna sometimes substituted
thick-skinned humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa
to feed the gods
in times of famine.
Or perhaps it was a sign of maturity:
a seeking of a higher apotheosis,
like how the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa was elevated—twice—
to the highest office of state piscis.

Beneath the serious tone
burned a second spine
of hope.
A string of compositions
examined the “Little Grass Shack’s” subtle, subversive meaning
(I’ve long suspected hapa-haole songs possess
this defiant, unerring, patriotic quality—
take, for example, Andy Cummings’ “Waikīkī”):
“Beneath the seductive scales, the song’s tough, touristic skin,
the old guitars are still playing.
They strum as humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa ‘go swimming by’,
past the City of Refuge,
past Kealakekua Bay.
It is the only line repeated twice:
bearing witness
to Captain Cook’s arrival,
bearing witness
to Captain Cook’s defeat.”

We are all shape-shifters,
Kahiolo seemed to say,
thrown into this world
searching,
exploring,
transforming,
peering anxiously,
eagerly,
eight generations into the future…

Now I see humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa
everywhere I go:
carved into mountains of Christmas sand
in the Sheraton Waikīkī’s lobby,
or hidden in a sneaker’s silhouette at Pioneer Saloon.
Its kinolau appears
in the most unexpected places:
pinned to the window of Hawaii National Bank,
or flying by on the freeway on a Tacoma’s punny tail-gate
(humuhumu nukunuku watufaka–what unexpected poetry!).
I have seen it baptized on utility boxes
and school playgrounds,
canonized in museums and airline magazines.
I have seen it at sunset while strolling with Hope,
or while doom scrolling at midnight
through my Facebook feed.

Even my infant son’s nocturnal grunts,
rooting at Jenn’s breast,
remind me now of the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa.

V.
Last night,
on a rare date night at Sushi Murayama,
Jenn and I ate the most delicious thing:
“Trigger-fish nigiri”
declared Chef Ryuji,
a kolohe smile rising to his face:
“topped with trigger fish liver,
a drizzle of sweet shoyu.”

It was the penultimate dish
of a lyrical progression
of omakase…
the volta of an impressive
gastronomic sonnet.

My heart trembled,
terrified at the sight of Chef Ryuji’s piece de resistance,
the fulfillment
of Kahiolo’s minor prophecy.

Now, late at night,
I find myself adding
to this robust literature,
mesmerized
by the humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa’s lithe,
littoral beauty.

Dear reader, has it always been this way?
Has the humuhumunukunukuapua’a
always existed,
locked stubbornly,
deliciously,
in our collective imagination?

Author’s Bio

Ryan Oishi is a writer, educator, and editor of Hoʻolana Publishing, a literary hui dedicated to uplifting Hawaiʻi’s many talented poets, writers, and artists. His work has appeared in Tinfish, Routes, Bamboo Ridge, The Value of Hawaiʻi 2, and The Statehood Project with Kumu Kahua Theatre. He is proud to be publishing with Kaleohano and Mahina, and thanks his friend, Ryan Shimotsu, for the seed of inspiration for this poem.

Image 1 Open Commons. Image 6 Open Commons. All other photos by Ryan Oishi.

Cover photos by staff.