The vocabulary for this page:
| word | meaning |
|---|---|
| e | (specifies an object) |
| ijo | thing, object |
| ilo | tool, machine, device |
| lipu | book, document, paper |
| lukin | eye, to look, to see, to seek to |
| olin | love, compassion, affection |
| pali | to do, to work, to make, labor |
| pana | to give, to send, to emit |
| telo | water, fluid, to water, to clean |
| tomo | home, room, structure |
To add a verb to the sentence, use the following structure:
[noun] li [verb]
For example,
mije li pali. - A man is working. / A man works.
Both the noun and the verb can have adjectives added after it. If added after a verb, the adjective functions as an adverb.
jan wawa li pali pona. - A strong person is working well.
There is no way to determine whether a word in such a sentence is an adjective or a verb. For example, the phrase “mi moku” can mean either “I am eating” or “I am food”.
Verbs don’t have any tense information in them. A way to specify time will be explained in a later page.
To add an object – the thing that the verb applies to – use the particle “e” for a following structure:
[subject] li [verb] e [object]
jan wawa li pali e tomo. - A strong person is (building/working on) a house.
Objects can also have adjectives added to them.
jan pali li pana e moku pona. - A worker gives out good food.
Here are some sentences:
jan pona mi li pona e ilo lukin. - My friend is (improving/fixing) a looking instrument (glasses, binoculars, microscope, etc.).
mi telo e moku. - I clean the food.
mi olin e meli mi. - I love my wife.
Since the word “lukin” itself describes the act of seeing someone, rather than their appearance, complimenting someone on the latter would usually be expressed as:
sina pona lukin. - You look good (are “good visually”).
Exercises
Now, try to figure out the meaning of these sentences.
- jan lili li pana e telo lukin.
- ona li lukin e lipu.
- soweli ike li utala e meli.
- jan utala li moku e kili suli.
- soweli lili li moku e telo.
- mi telo e ijo suli.
And try to translate the following sentences into toki pona.
- She loves every person.
- The bathroom (“house of water”) is good.
- I hand out documents.
- An evil warrior is looking at your house.
- My tools are working well.