We feature each fortnight Nicholas Reid's reviews and comments on new and recent books.
“HOPURANGI – SONGCATCHER, Poems from the Maramataka” by Robert Sullivan (Auckland University Press, $29.99); “AUP NEW POETS 10”, edited by Anne Kennedy (AUP, $29.99); “TOWN” by Madeleine Slavick (The Cuba Press, $30); “TIDELINES” by Kiri Piahana-Wong (Anahera Press, $NZ25.)
It is a formidable task to do justice to Robert Sullivan’s Hopurangi Songcatcher. Much longer than most collections of poetry its 144 pages encompass approximately130 poems. I have read carefully all these poems, but the review you are reading simply cannot examine or consider in detail every poem, so I am reduced to giving you generalities.
Maramatanka means the Maori lunar year and, says Sullivan in his introduction, the poems take place over three months according to that lunar system. Further, his introduction tells us that he was concerned to reconnect with his late father’s iwi, but also to connect with other iwi important in his life. In many of his poems he references whakapapa and the desire to re-connect with family and forebears. The poem “Tamatea Kai-ariki: Tautoko” concerns his academic searches to verify whakapapa. What this may imply is that to some degree he has often been living a way of life that is not fully Maori – and he has Pakeha in his whakapapa (not only his Irish name Sullivan but also reference to a forbear called Paddy). Put it all together and, in what he calls in his introduction “a period of personal change and growth”, his poems aim to bring him back to his Maori side. But there is a flexibility in his points of reference. In New Zealand as it now is, it is impossible for anybody, Maori or Pakeha, to be unaware of mass media, pop and rock tunes etc. Sullivan refers to these things, every so often showing his pleasure in off-shore music. For example in the poem ”Tangaroa-a-mua: Ranginui” Sullivan puts together a revered piece of Maori mythology with a pop song sung by Diana Ross. He also describes, in “Turu: Just last week” a present-day account of a literary gathering, crammed with poets.
The poems begin with “Paua Canticle”, where the poet is walking on the Oamaru beach and trying to connect with sea-food and the tide, seeing all things as connected. In his often quizzical poetry he ties tradition with the present. In “Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Machine” there is the clash between the dead animals of the past and the present museum in which they stand in class cages. In “Pupurangi Shelley” he tells us that the kauri snail in the forest is ultimately linked to supermarkets and then emphasises the millennia in which these islands have existed. He pours on a degree of satire in “The Paper Chase” where he imagines all the different copies of the Treaty of Waitangi being eaten away by giant kauri snails.
But this is simply the overture. The major interest of the volume follows the stages of the moon taking us through the lunar cycle in terms of Medium Energy, Low Energy and High Energy before lapsing into Low Energy and Medium Energy again. The moon influences our moods and the times when we can work or think. In Medium Energy he is concerned with the happiness of relating to his iwi and their customs which he is just learning and feeling the energy of the marae. The first Low Energy appears to deal with his sexuality in the poem “I Went Alone to the Taj Mahal”. In “I Was Wondering Why”, the clouds mute the sun with greyness. Medium Energy counters with the poem “Ouenuku: Mauri Ora” where, despite the rain “the awards are for the young people to give their ha / to the sky, who encourage us to thrive…” Rain can be a blessing. “Anei Ano he Ra” affirms that there is such a thing as love where “Now I know that to believe / in aroha, or love, is honourable and plain, / no similes for it except to say that love / has a purpose.” In fact, as Sullivan suggest, love can be joyful. The poem “Okoro – I had a cat once” appears to suggests that the cat’s animal joy at having a litter is in itself a form of love.
Some of Sullivan’s poems are of moods of despondence – of opportunities lost or unhelpful situations, as in “I opened a box” and also in “Korekore Whakapiri: Recycling” about the difficulty of clipping a hedge – everyday things. But there are also poems of exultation and joy as in “Rakaumatoi: E Hoa” [High Energy] which begins “How do I love you, my friends? / Let me count the mountain’s ways, / the heightened plains that bend / up into snowy reaches, playing / in the mind out of sight, to send / pillars of light, clouds, rain / on a grateful garden bed…” Delight can be sparked by the forces of nature.
It is perhaps inevitable that Sullivan, affirming his Maori self, takes some shots at colonialism, even if this is not his main interest. In “Tangaroa Whariki Kiokio: Another grey day” the “grey” refers to 19th century George Grey wherein “when you think about / our colonial history, they’re all Grey days”, Grey being the epitome of British rule. Inasmuch as there is activism, Sullivan has a poem celebrating the use of Maori writers texts in schools “You’ll get an e-mail from me”. “Orongonui: The Corrections” has him discussing how over the years he was not encouraged to use the Maori language. And the poem “Rakaunui: He Whenua Manu”, while not chastising James Cook directly, does tell an anecdote about him that puts Cook in a bad light. There is criticism here, but not rage. That is not Sullivan’s style.
One outstanding interest for Sullivan is birds, often seen as omens, messengers or passengers coming seasonally to this country. “Tamatea Kai-ariki: Three birds flew from me” is an admirable lyric, which I quote here in full: “Three birds flew from me: / a sparrow from my chest / a tui out of my throat / a pilwaka from my thigh / they flew to see my father / to let him know I am well / then the monarch butterflies / took their turns to see my / grandmother / once they saw the birds / were safely flown / and then the bees / came back to the field / to help the new manuka / akeake, harakeke, totara, / ti kouka and kowhai / bring back the birds.” More ironical is “Otane: Feeding the Birds of the World” which considers all the birds from other parts of the world that fly in to Christchurch seasonally… right next to a museum filled with stuffed birds in glass cases. More directly, “Tamatea a Ngana: Huia” laments the wilful extinction of the huia.
True to the concept of the Maori lunar years, the whole collection ends fittingly with “Turu: Hoki Whenua Mai” with the stars of Matariki rising “knowing Matariki will lift / our sap to the full moon.” But the most pure depiction of the moon as we see it is “Oike: Marama sits up in the west”, much earlier in the whole collection.
Hopurangi Songcatcher is a thoughtful and detailed collection, often requiring very close reading and touching on many moods in a quest for identity. Are there any flaws? Only two small ones. I cannot see the point of the re-telling of “Jack and the Beanstalk” which comes near the end of the book; and the typeface is rather faint. But those are my only grumbles about an important text.
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For some years now, Auckland University Press has encouraged younger poets with their New Poets series, each of which contains the work of three poets. Generous space is given and each poet presents what amounts to a full collection. The tenth in the series introduces three very different poets.
Tessa Keenan’s Pukapuka mapi / Atlas has a refreshing straightforwardness to it – the candour of an alert and observant young woman, often using prose poems in her accounts of her region, the beach, fields and mountains; but also in the behaviour of people of her own age. The poem “Scurvy Girls” is a witty round-up of the behaviour of young women. She often relates to somebody she loves; and in “Permission to Hate”, she makes it clear that she does not hate the person she loves but does express her hatred of other things (colonisation, money, ownership) beyond her control. And there is much critical satire in “Killing Time in the Canterbury Museum”. “Moonwalk” suggest both present joy and the limitations of a young person with the lament “One day I will run out of new things to do. / I hope there will still be things to look at without distraction.” Speaking as a Maori, however, one of her greatest concerns is the present and the past of the Maori people. “Tataraimaka Pa” is a lament for the past, as so (obliquely) is “Taranaki”; but the fullest examination of the past is “Some Other Pa” [connected to the collection’s title] where present-day conceptions of space and distance contrast with traditional ways of perceiving. This is a robust and very readable collection.
romesh dissanayake’s Favourite Flavour House displays a very different type of poet. His roots were in Sri Lanka and in his adult years he looks quizzically at New Zealand but also refers back to his land of birth. There are opening poems about Asian food outlets in New Zealand, and he appears to himself be part of the culinary profession. A long ten-part sequence called “Six a.m. in Colombo / Cinnamon Gardens” carries him though much of his childhood and youth, learning among other things that “When the going gets tough the educated emigrate / and when the going got rough / we sold wood apple juice / sealed in small plastic tubes / with a comb and a candle / and bought three / wet summers’ worth in airfares.” So to the leaving Sri Lanka and some riotous behaviour in London before he records a more domestic way life… at least this is how it may be if he is a confessional poet. There is much emphasis on food but also on drugs. There is a tension between his culinary skills and his weariness with his work, telling us “the truth is I’m tired / writing cute little poems to please white people…” Hip? Ironic? Or genuinely world-weary? You choose. Of the three poets in this book, romesh dissanayake is apparently the most experienced. His first novel is about to be published.
Sadie Lawrence‘s poems were written between the ages of seventeen and nineteen. Her collection is called Like Human Girls / all we have is noise. There are overtones of romanticism in the opening poem “(one month) Anniversary” with the speaker dizzy in what is apparently first love: “Tonight, the world is a pearl / cradled in adolescent hands. / Tonight, this bridge is a virginal marriage bed; / we were the first to wrap ourselves in it black blanket”. Lawrence’s style is rich with metaphors, one could almost say courtly. It is no criticism to note that these are adolescent poems because Lawrence consciously deal with the adolescent situation. “All Teenagers are Tapestries” deals with the bloodiness of women’s lives – including surgery and menstruation. Some poems touch on the awkwardness of relating to males and there are poems about leaving home. Or wishing to. Melodrama finds its way into the imagery when the poem “Thank God” touches on popular narratives about romantic suicides. The poet makes grandiose claims of how bad she is in the poem “I’m not like other girls (I’m much worse)”, this being the adolescent chastising herself. It all adds up to a heady mix, and an engaging one.
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Cuba Press announces Town as “fifty stories and fifty images by award-winning writer and photographer Madeleine Slavick” and that is a fair summary. Slavick’s book, almost pocket-size, is as much a work of visual art as of a work of poetry. Rather than calling its words “stories” I would call them prose poems. The title poem “Town” declares that “town” can mean a city or country or volcano or landscape, wherever people or animals are. Whether it was Madeleine Slavick’s intention or not, that relates to the now discarded term “townland” [not used in this collection] which used to mean simply a wide piece of land. American born and Hong Kong raised, Slavick see New Zealand in a different light from NZ-born writers.
The opening poem “The Road Where I Live” begins “A straight line fifteen kilometres long. I walk in one direction one day, and in the other on the next. Seventeen cars pass. Almost every driver waves.” And what follows is almost idyllic in its description of the country, the animals and the friendly people… but Slavick is canny enough to also show that there are nearby state highways and railways. The land she describes is almost, but not quite, the Garden of Eden. Thus with many of her poems – there is mention of earthquakes and death at the railway crossing as well as other tragedies. She has some memories of living in Hong Kong; she tries to learn the Maori language; she notes the fate of Kiwi. The Piwakawaka is honoured with this [complete] poem “Stops. Flaps at eyeline, then darts, sideways. / A man called a loved one Fantail. She also left.” There are accounts of people who encourage others to join a book club. She is bemused by where community halls are. And of course there are sometimes annoying intrusions into domestics live. “Landline” reads in full: “Dinnertime, telephone rings, / A computer company makes an offer. / No, thank you, and I put down the receiver. / The woman calls back and asks why I hung up.”
Given the landscape Slavick depicts, there are forthright statements about the ecology. A very robust poem “Declaration” begins “When our forests were forests, people couldn’t hear their own voices for the birdsong. Three, forty, seventy, ninety miles of bush, of song, before trees and their crowns thrown down, mounds fifteen metres high for the burning.”… and goes on to see the casual pollution there is in many forests and waterways. “Animal Stories” charts the hunting done by introduced animals. Not that it is all her prose poems are earnest. The poem “Write, Writer” is an ironic take on the different ways writing is accepted.
This is an enjoyable collection which can be browsed at leisure, text and images.
A word about the photographs – while there are rural images of the seasons and weather, there are also images that suggest irony or criticism: the amateur sign saying FREE leaning against a tree; the almost brutalist signs saying MEAT and SOCIETY. But countering these are the thoughtful benches with the shadow of a tree falling on them; the beautiful photo of two flowers close up, one wilting… and so forth. Yes, Slavick is a very professional photographer.
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Kiri Piahana-Wong’s Tidelines begins and ends with the story from centuries ago of Hinerangi who, after tragic events including her husband’s drowning, died on the west coast of what is now called Waitakere. The opening poem “Hinerangi” has Hinerangi directly addressing us and the closing poem “In the Beginning” brings us back to Hinerangi speaking. The whole of this slim collection is written in the first person, but in between first and last poems, it is mainly a modern young woman who is speaking. Or is she? Sometimes she is like an avatar of Hinerangi, observing the lands and beaches that she knew centuries ago, though they are now in a different condition. It is as if she can now see what has become the land she died in. The 8-part sequence “A sequence of birds” begins “Once again I am looking at flowers. / These are hydrangeas, picked / surreptitiously from a hedge outside / a bach at Laingholm Beach.” Staying on Auckland’s west coast, the modern narrator lives for a while at Piha, where she is moved by the nature and the sea and perhaps especially by the sky and the rain that evoke gods “I feel it / - the sky’s water: all the wondrous light / weeping joyous tears of the sky god, / Ranginui, running down my side and / into the earth, Papatuanuku, and then / settling there.”
But Hinerangi addresses the modern narrator in the poem “So far below”, suggesting that the present-day, modern narrator knows too little about herself. And here the poet becomes confessional, with poems in which she addresses her own moods, apparently often melancholy. “Messenger Bird” wonders if a messenger bird can be more effective than modern communications as she feels cut off from people. The sequence “Happiness” has an ironical title because it is mostly concerned with the fleeting nature of happiness and moods of despondency. “Falling” suggests uncertainness and a sense of emptiness and “Storytelling” is particularly unhappy, contemplating suicide. It is good that the final poem gives a sense of solidarity with another woman, even if she lived long ago.
Kiri Piahana-Wong writes lucidly – she allows us to understand why she is so related to a long-dead woman and she presents vividly the nature of the coast she scans.
