XXVI.--THE HULA KU’I MOLOKAI

Unwritten Literature of Hawaii, by Nathaniel B. Emerson, [1909], at sacred-texts.com

p. 207

The hula ku’i Molokai was a variety of the Hawaiian dance that originated on the island of Molokai, probably at a later period than what one would call the classic times. Its performance extended to the other islands. The author has information of its exhibition on the island of its name as late as the last quarter of the nineteenth century. The actors, as they might be called, in this hula were arranged in pairs who faced each other and went through motions similar to those of boxing. This action, ku’i, to smite, gave the name to the performance. The limiting word Molokai was added to distinguish it from another still more modern form of dance called ku’i, which will be described later.

While the performers stood and went through with their motions, marching and countermarching, as they are said to have done, they chanted or recited in recitative some song, of which the following is an example. This they did with no instrumental accompaniment:

p. 208

[Translation]

Song

The platitudes of mere sentimentalism, when put into cold print, are not stimulating to the imagination; moods and states of feeling often approaching the morbid, their oral expression needs the reenforcement of voice, tone, countenance, the whole attitude. They are for this reason most difficult of translation and when rendered literally into a foreign speech often become meaningless. The figures employed also, like the watergourds and wine-skins of past generations and of other peoples, no longer appeal to us as familiar objects, but require an effort of the imagination to make them intelligible and vivid to our mental vision. If the translator carries these figures of speech over into his new rendering, they will often demand an explanation on their own account, and will thus fail of their original intent; while if he clothes the thought in some new figure he takes the risk of failing to do justice to the intimate meaning of the original. The force of these remarks will become apparent from an analysis of the prominent figures of speech that occur in the mele.

Mele

p. 209

[Translation]

Song

This mele inoa--name-song or eulogy--was composed in celebration of the lamented princess, Nahienaena, who, before she was misled by evil influences, was a most attractive and promising character. She was the daughter of Keopuolani and younger sister of Kamehameha III, and came to her untimely death in 1836. The name was compounded from the words na, the, áhi, fires, and énaéna, hot, a meaning which furnishes the motive to the mele.

Footnotes

207:a Kai olohia. A calm and tranquil sea. This expression has gained a poetic vogue that almost makes it pass current as a single word, meaning tranquillity, calmness of mind. As thus explained. it is here translated by the expression "heart's-ease."

207:b Makani hanai-loli. A wind so gentle as not to prevent the bêche de mer (loli), sea-anemones, and other marine slugs from coming out of their holes to feed. A similar figure is used in the next line in the expression kai pale iliahi. The thought is that the calmness of the ocean invites one to strip and plunge in for a bath.

207:c Kauwá ke aloha i na lehua o Kaana. Kaana is said to be a hill on the road from Keaau to Olaa, a spot where travelers were wont to rest and where they not infrequently made up wreaths of the scarlet lehua bloom which there abounded. It took a large number of lehua flowers to suffice for a wreath, and to bind them securely to the fillet that made them a garland was a work demanding not only artistic skill but time and patience. If a weary traveler, halting at Kaana, employed his time of rest in plaiting flowers into a wreath for some loved one, there would be truth as well as poetry in the saying, "Love slaves for the lehuas of Kaana."

208:a Punawai o Maná. A spring of water at Honuapo, Hawaii, which bubbled up at such a level that the ocean covered it at high tide.

209:a Ka ohai o Mapépe. A beautiful flowering shrub, also spoken of as ka ohai o Papi’o-huli, said to have been brought from Kahiki by Namaka-o-kaha’i.

209:b Kawelo-hea. A blowhole or spouting horn, also at Honuapo, through which the ocean at certain times sent up a column of spray or of water. After the volcanic disturbance of 1868 this spouting horn ceased action. The rending force of the earthquakes must have broken up and choked the subterranean channel through which the ocean had forced its way.