Light and dark rā versus pō
the shadows that creased your face were held
then released.
Columns reach skyward, and punga stones rest beneath cubic facades
with sharpened edges. Deconstructed beneath the night sky, I am unable to
hear your voice in concentric circles, that echo and repeat like rings of fire—
there is only this ever-present black.
The injustice of it and stark lines
where others lie in their moulded condolences,
amidst rubble piles of revulsion.
Unfathomable pain points me towards the absurdity of your enforced death.
And I count days, weeks, moons, when all that remains is a red mourning light.
Tangi te mapu, I am drawn in and out, until the ground swells where I stand,
in cruciform protest, inside this ever-present black.
Kākāriki returns me to your smile
kōwhai your voice whero your aroha
like a melody of encircled halos — around your infinite absence.
Ancient histories without human voices, where I listen solely to the manu
and the lack of anyone’s authority. It is there I lean inwards, in triangulated
opposition to the storm-clouded ether. Now, I hear you say, look up Mā,
for soon a comet will streak across this ever-present black.
