ee ya ha ha!

the hauling

xxv power/powerlessness

waka cuts it

Maori in magazines

remarkable

sensational

sports stars

Maori models wear groovy fashion

single studded ears

indigenous beauty

at the second Maori expo

dark green lipstick

sips from silver

coffee cups

xxvi

I rest Star Waka on Nga Waka Maori

by Anne Nelson, white tipped

paddles raised to catch

the setting sun

which sets them

yellow, red bodies

the colour

of the waka,

men hongi’ing the nose

of the waka,

faces touching before

their launch

into the mind

of Tangaroa.

xxvii

and the mind of Tangaroa

is disturbed by his brother

Tawhirimatea – turns

his back on greenstone seas

into alcoholic vortices

focuses

on whirlpool Tangaroa

what a spewer!

until brother tires

of being a blowhard

retreats to distance

where offspring of the real

perpetrator – Tane Mahuta –

with genetic memory

of fights and their patterns

find paua seek hapuka

glide along greenstone

lines of thought

xxviii Hooked

some say the South Island

is a waka

the North Island is a fish

and the Cook Strait cable (I reckon)

is the only link between them

Waka 29 waka taua

xxx

in three weeks I turn 30

in three decades

men have landed

on the moon

women have become prime ministers

thousands gained PhDs

trillions of dollars circulated

soft wood forests grown to maturity

52 x 30 no.1 hit singles

mortgages completely repaid

the microcomputer has developed

and I have achieved feelings

I didn’t have before –

what about you?

xxxi

spirals in the tauihu

signatures in water

waka cutting each other’s wake

signing

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

visible from the air

someone in a helicopter

took a photo

counted the signatures

later

xxxii herenga waka

we all belong to a waka

those of us lucky enough to trace

our whakapapa back to Hawaiiki

into times of divinity when all things

Maori were also divine

but we belong to an ugly side too

collected slaves and wars

we were imperfect gods

not unlike the antiquarian

beasts and gladiators of Europe

but the waka carries us all

above the water

xxxiii

a poem about the weight of wood

native trees in their entirety

not like trees in H. R. Puffenstuff

(the talking variety)

but the energy within them

pushing out leaves in Spring, sap etc.

(like your email says)

energy derived from the heater up there

and the pull of the moon (not proven

but surely?) this heat goes into waves

and the things above them – air itself –

which gyres invisibly except for the things

it touches – leaves, branches, buildings

foundations for natural and human

constructions

some set to float by the measure

of the circumference of seas –

displaced in degrees

by wood and by land

xxxiv Goldie (2)

Our cat’s name was Goldie,

daughter of Black Jet,

sister of Black Jet Junior and Gingy –

their brother

was Spotty.

C. F. Goldie was and remains

a famous New Zealand