Ask the Brindled: Poems

In her ambitious debut, a “National Poetry” series winner, queer Oiwi (Native Hawaiian) poet Revilla shows how much the self (and particularly her self) is rooted in body, bloodlines, and a desecrated land and culture that must be reclaimed. The first section opens by defining mo‘o partly as a “shapeshifting water protector, lizard, woman, deity,” and a lizard with whom the poet identifies glides through it, shedding skin (“From seed to summit, our bones matter”) as it transmogrifies to play the role of defender and inciter (“A wasp’s nest is growing/ where my hurt should be”). The second section, in which mo‘o is defined partly as “Narrow path,” limns relationships between women (“By the third lover, she had peeled so much skin she be-/ came a woman who could walk on blood”), while the third section homes in ferociously on colonialism: “Erasure poetry builds family from scars, but forgiveness is not a home.” The final section, with Mo‘o as “beloved grandchild” and the brindlings that “feed and protect,” returns to a strong series of family poems.