Even the T-shirts are tired of themselves,

But don’t take the lava rocks.

Pele’s curse is a real thing:

Cancer, heart-attacks, financial ruin.

Just ask Karen, who took coral and sand,

Then lost her dogs, her house, and her husband.

He gave me a heart-shaped rock,

And I got kidney stones; it’s true,

Pele has a bad temper.

Thousands of pounds of rock

sent home to the island each year:

Place this back from where it came,

They scribble out to some unknown.

Absolution, it’s that easy:

Your hollowed-out heart,

An envelope, a stranger,

And a cruel goddess

Who is supposed to forgive.