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John Puhiatau Puleonline works |
15 The new missionary and his wife have arrived to a great welcome in the capital, dance groups, umu, gifts. They have a four year old girl who is like a ghost with deep blue eyes, her hair is like wire bent around a tree a hundred times. The mother chose ten maidens who pamper her fragile soul that is weakened by heat and flies that love her mouth. She is olive, small hands and a mouth big as a horse. The husband, with a beard that pulls his face down like a plant struck back by lack of water, meets the elders who are sure they meet God’s representative from golden heaven. But it is his ears that flap in the wind when he talks through a translator that show his teeth, brown like shit. I met the wife one evening as I was on my way home, after helping my uncle sell four sacks of copra. She could not help looking at my fine necklace of sharks’ teeth, so I offered to show her where I go fishing, which I did the next morning when she came to Liku on a donkey. I sent her maid away to fetch water, these palagi are always thirsty. She had shed her clothes and was in the waves drinking the sun. I swim under water and hold her legs while I kiss the earth. She struggled like a fish harpooned when I entered from behind. And her body shivered as we moved for a long time. In the sea it is hot. I swim away to shore. I leave her out there looking up to God, although she smiles the glow on her face is as savage as my uncle.
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