In "The old woman's message" by Kumalau Tawali, what does the speaker instruct in the poem's first 5 lines?

In “The Old Woman’s Message,” by Kumalau Tawali, the first five lines of the poem are an important part of the message, which is mentioned in the title. The poem, overall, is about a woman—a mother—who is dying and wants her sons to come back to her before she passes. She is sad that they are gone and have stayed away for so long, when other mothers’ sons return. They are possibly away working, but in her desperation and love, she longs to see them one last time.

The first five lines of the poem are the action and driving force for the rest of the poem. The speaker, who is the mother, gives a message to take to her missing sons. Asking someone to stick the message in their hair is like saying to put the message somewhere safe where you can carry it with you. She tells the person to take the words (her message for the boys to return to her) to her two sons, Polin and Manuai.

She speaks of ripe fruit falling and returning to the trunk, which is a way of saying that her grown sons should return to their mother. The speaker expresses concern and sadness that her sons have not returned to her and may not before she dies.

What is the "old woman's message" in Kumalau Tawali's poem "The Old Woman's Message"?

The old woman's message is a combination of information and a request: she speaks of how old and frail and thin she's become, and she asks that her sons, Polin and Manuai, return home to see her before she passes away. The old woman feels that her sons have forgotten her, and, in their absence, she has wasted away to practically nothing. Her hands, she says, are "like broomsticks," and her legs can fit into the hole of a very small animal, the sand crab. She sees the sons of other women returning to them, and she grieves, wondering why her sons should be different from theirs. What are her sons thinking in staying away so long? She cannot fathom it. However, as she grows weaker, "sway[ing] like a dry falling leaf," she hopes they will make it in time to be with her when she dies and to attend her wake.

In this poem, an old woman is sending a message to her two sons that she would like them to come and visit her. She tells them she has gotten old and is ready to die. She says is she is dried out, withered and frail, so her sons should come and see her now. She calls her sons her fruit and says that other people's sons come back and visit them, so they should too. She feels neglected because her sons are so far from her. In her mind, they are a part of her, and she would like them to be there for her at the end, not for any money they might have, but simply because they are her children. The poem itself is her message to them, and to all sons and daughters, not to neglect their aged mothers.

In "The Old Woman's Message" by Kumalau Tawali, what does the speaker mean in lines 10 and 11?

Lines 10 and 11 of Tawali's poem read as follows:

Let them keep the price of their labour 
but their eyes are mine. 

In this poem, an old woman, near death, wishes to see her sons, Polin and Manuai, again. She wants them to come home to her before she dies. In these lines, she is saying that she doesn't want their money: this is what "price of their labour" means. Let them keep what wages they have earned, she says, but let them come to her, because she wants to look into their eyes ("their eyes are mine.") Since eyes are often understood in poetry as "the windows of the soul," we can interpret this to mean that she wants to see into their souls as well as their bodies again one more time before she dies. She is asserting that some part of them is hers--she is their mother, she gave birth to them (she is the tree and they are the fruit) and raised them.

Earlier in the poem, she likens sons to fruits, and says that fruit returns to its trunk, the mother, but that her sons are neglecting her. Right before lines 10 and 11 she says:

I see the sons of other women 
returning. What is in their minds? 

The "their" in the "What is in their minds?" is ambiguous: it could mean several things. It could refer to the minds of the sons of other women or the women themselves, but it could be asking the question, what is in her own sons' minds? That she is wondering about her own sons is supported by the repetition of "their" in line 10. 

Lines 10 and 11 are the cry of dying woman who wants to see her sons one more time, not for the money they can give her, but for themselves, because they are her sons. 

In Kumalau Tawali's poem “The Old Woman’s Message,” what does the speaker imply in the first five lines?

The speaker is a very old lady, who wistfully longs for her sons’ return. Polin and Manuai are her sons, who are away from her when she needs them the most. She is about to die and has “little breath left to wait for them.” So, through an unidentified person, she is sending a message to her sons exhorting them to come back to their dying mother. She says,

the ripe fruit falls and returns
to the trunk –

Here, “the ripe fruit” symbolizes her grown-up sons, while “the trunk” stands for the old mother herself. The comparison of sons and daughters to flowers, and parents to roots of a tree trunk is old and conventional. If not plucked, a ripe fruit has a tendency to fall down itself to the ground close to the tree trunk.

What the old mother implies is - now that her sons are able and self-dependent persons, and are educated and skilled enough to earn their livelihood, they must come back to her.

The mother, on the other hand, has lost the agility and grace of her youth. Both physically and mentally, she has grown infirm and dependent. She urgently needs the presence and support of her sons.

So, we see that by giving the example of a ripe fruit falling and returning to the trunk in her message, the old mother urges her sons to return to her. A tone of indignation can also be felt in these lines. It sounds as if the forlorn and disappointed mother is reminding her children that they should have returned by now by themselves, but they seem to have forgotten her. 

"Stick these words in your hair
and take them to Polin and Manuai
my sons:
the ripe fruit falls and returns
to the trunk - its mother."

These are the first five lines of the poem "The Old Woman's Message" by Kamalau Tawali. These particular lines can be read separately from the rest of the poem, as they stand as a cohesive sentence.

As you can see, in these lines, the speaker is ordering the listener to take a specific message to her two sons, named Polin and Manuai. The message is that "ripe fruit falls and returns to the trunk," which is its mother. Meaning, probably, that children should come back to their mother when she needs them: it's the natural thing to do, just like fruit falls naturally beneath the tree that has grown it.

The rest of the poem reveals that the speaker is growing thin and weak and is close to death, and she needs her sons to be near her. It seems to her that Polin and Manuai have forgotten about her, "like fruit borne by birds," and that they've drifted far away from her. The situation is frustrating to the speaker, who observes that other women's sons stay near their own mothers. A sense of longing and desperation fills the poem, which you can feel in those initial lines as the speaker gives the order to carry the message so heavy with imagery.