volume one 2020 Published by Te Whē Press Te Kāhui Ruruhau: Contributors: Patricia Grace Anahera Gildea Renée Anne-Marie Te Whiu Wellington 2020 Haare Williams Anne Waapu Joe Harawira Annette Morehu Mike Ross Arihia Latham Volume one copyright © Te Whē John Huria Ataria Sharman ki Tukorehe, Te Hau o te Whenua Witi Ihimaera Becky Manawatu Editors: Cassandra Barnett Individual essays copyright © their Anahera Gildea Emma Espiner individual authors as listed in the Nadine Anne Hura Kahu Kutia contents page 2020 Kirsty Dunn Copy Editor: Michelle Rahurahu Anne-Marie Te Whiu Miriama Gemmell ISSN: 2703-600656 Nadine Anne Hura Graphic Designer: Nicole Titihuia Hawkins Chloē Reweti Renée Edition .................... of 200 Ruby Mae Hinepunui Solly Images courtesy of: Sinead Overbye Anahera Gildea The development and publishing of Te Kahureremoa Taumata Haare Williams this inaugural edition of Te Whē ki Tukorehe, Te Hau o te Whenua is Courtney Delamere generously supported by Creative Nadine Anne Hura New Zealand. Te Kahureremoa Taumata Kiriana O'Connell Karangatia Te hau kōriporipo Te hau kōmurimuri Te hau kōtangitangi Tau ana te korowai āhuru o Rangiātea e Pōhutukawa e Rangarangahia ngā hau e whā Ko Te Tai Tokerau Ko Te Tai Rāwhiti Ko Te Wai Pounamu Kei Te Tai Hauauru e! Image courtesy of Anahera Gildea Rokirokitia te manawa Tākina ko te Pū E te puna kōrero o Ngāti Tukorehe, mōu i manaakitia, mōu i whāngaihia, Ngaehe ko te Whē mōu i manawanui mai kia puāwai ai mātou ngā kaituhi o Te Whē. Ki roto Tuhia ki te hauwhenua i Tukorehe i ngā whārangi nei te whakatinanatanga o te kōrero 'e kore au e ngaro, he Tihei mauri ora! kākano i ruia mai i Rangiātea.' He mihi mutunga kore. 3 'I te timatanga te kupu I write and paint the living spirit in the spoken word' Haare Williams 3 ngā wāhanga kōrero contents 4 karanga 8 kupu whakataki 10 kupu arataki Nadine Anne Hura preface introduction Anahera Gildea Anahera Gildea 13 te kāhui ruruhau Haare Williams, Joe Harawira, John Huria, Mike Ross, Patricia Grace and Renée 24 ko te pō - all night party with a grand piano 28 taku aho e - he pātere 30 i sit in a room... Haare Williams Te Kahureremoa Taumata Renée 32 he mōteatea 38 kōhanga hou 46 (I) rui ruia, (II) kapakapa, (III) tui tuia Anahera Gildea Kirsty Dunn Arihia Latham 50 the invitation 53 karapipiti 54 mihi ki a J.C. Sturm Becky Manawatu Miriama Gemmell Emma Espiner 58 mihi ki a nanny hokohoko 60 a series of never ending beginnings Nadine Hura Anne Waapu 5 69 karakia 70 enlightened 75 modern e-mihi Kirsty Dunn Emma Espiner Miriama Gemmell 76 letter from the girl frankenstein 80 hē: to be wrong, mistaken, incorrect 84 marking the body Ruby Solly Ataria Sharman - a reflection on receiving tā moko Ruby Solly 92 whenua hei whanau 94 down the fish trap 98 Tukorehe Miriama Gemmell Cassandra Barnett Reneé 102 i missed the hui at Tukorehe and i cried 106 reap what you sow 108 moumou Annette Morehu Nicole Titihuia Hawkins Kahu Kutia 115 tūī 116 koru 121 a short distance from home Ruby Solly Nadine Anne Hura Anne-Marie Te Whiu 122 whakarongo 125 mai oro, yō taim 126 karanga tonu mai, hoki ai Michelle Rahurahu Miriama Gemmell Sinead Overbye 134 Rangiātea 136 ko te pū Anahera Gildea Nadine Anne Hura 142 te hau o te whenua 144 kaituhi 146 whakakapi whakapapa o ngā kaituhi contributors Courtney Delamere 5 kupu whakataki preface Anahera Gildea Stories have laid the foundation of all of my learning, institutions through a Eurocentric lens. I wanted to open the critical discourse space and and have been the viewfinder through which I have invite a mātauranga Māori lens to both the creation and reading of literature. often understood the world. Māori Marsden says The path I set myself on was to employ a kaupapa Māori research methodology that words are symbols of thought, and therefore without entailed consulting with, and taking direction from, relevant Māori communities words we cannot think. Apirana Ngata alludes to the in order to both guide and answer my questions surrounding what constitutes Māori act of creativity - the emergence of a poem, waiata, literature, what constitutes a mātauranga Māori lens, and how to approach the or mōteatea - as an act of healing of both self and business of creative writing. community. It is with these two ideas in mind that this project began. From the outset of the project proper, Nadine Anne Hura and I have worked in concert every step of the way. Kāore e ārikarika ngā kupu mihi ki a ia. E hoa, kapohia Te Whē – Te Hau o te Whenua began as part of my ēnei kupu hei tohu aroha mōu. I have been incredibly humbled and fortunate to have doctoral research in creative writing at Te Pūtahi Tuhi co-created, and worked as kaihautū on this project with you. Auaha o te Ao/The IIML at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington. One of the key issues I was Te Whē is the emergence of that work into the world. It is one of the outcomes of a grappling with was that ‘Māori literature’ was still marae-based wānanga that took place at Tukorehe Marae, he uri ahau o reira, at Kuku predominantly being taught and analysed at academic in Ōhau. 7 From the inception, we strived to consult widely with To Aunty Moerangi, Uncle Keelan, Parekarewa Ransfield, and Courtney Delamere, our literary communities and received consistent who shared kōrero with us and supported us - ki mua, ki muri - pupū ake ai i te encouragement and support. E rere ā māua kupu mihi whatumanawa ēnei kupu mō koutou ko te iwi o Tukorehe. ki a Patricia Grace, Robyn Bargh, Eboni Waitere, To our families and friends, ka titia te ngākau ki ngā whakaaro mō koutou. Alice Te Punga Somerville, Arini Loader, Tayi Tibble, Kiriana O'Connell, Alex Keeble, Cassandra Barnett, and Anne-Marie Te Whiu, there are Emily Perkins, Damien Wilkins, and Mike Ross who simply not enough words to thank you for all your work behind the scenes. sat around a table with us at the earliest stages of a To Chloē Reweti, whose patience is now legendary, and to Sydney Shep and fledgling idea and helped direct our thinking. Miriame Barbarich for the generous time, ideas and energy you gifted us. Me mihi ka tika ki Te Pūtahi Tuhi Auaha o te Ao/ And to the Kāhui Ruruhau, arā ko Patricia Grace rātou ko Renée, ko Haare The International Institute of Modern Letters, who Williams, ko Joe Harawira, ko Witi Ihimaera, ko Mike Ross, ko John Huria, provided development funding to help us get started, me iri ki ngā pātū o te whare kōrero ēnei kupu mihi mō koutou. Thank you for laying and who continue to support and encourage us. down the whakapapa for us to follow, and for sharing so unfailingly your expertise, time, and whakaaro for this project. We cannot express our gratitude enough. Nei rā te mihi ki a Debbie Broughton and Kim McBreen from Te Wānanga o Raukawa who sat with us to wānanga, refine and further deepen our ideas, i tō Ko Tainui te waka Ko Hineāmaru te tipuna koutou manaakitanga mai ki a māua. Ko Tararua ngā pae maunga Ko Tokerau te maunga Kei wareware i ahau, me mihi ki a koutou, te whānau Ko Ōhau te awa Ko Taumarere te awa o TOI Māori. Thank you for your continued and Ko Tukorehe te iwi, te hapū, te marae Ko Ngati Hine, Ko Ngāpuhi ngā iwi unwavering support. Through the crucial funding of Ko Anahera Gildea tōku ingoa Ko Nadine Anne Hura ahau TOI we were able to hold the wānanga which was the foundation for the work in this book. To the writers who gathered at the waharoa, and who entered to participate, collaborate, and bring their deepest questions and thinking. Kua tau mai te wā kia mihia koutou. 7 kupu arataki introduction Anahera Gildea ‘Place is the first of all beings.’ Archytas I am not a gardener. My relationship with soil is entirely their experiences, and the seeds of their whakaaro that they would plant in this whenua. to do with whenua. In the history of literature in Aotearoa, This pukapuka is the culmination of a project begun by Nadine Anne Hura and ‘home’ has almost become a trope in its own right. myself with a determination to bring into focus the ‘landscape’ of Māori literature, Whether it be a distant and yearned for location, a reo rua. It sits in a long and crucial whakapapa of those who preceded us, of the many geographical certainty, a familiar smell, whānau, or an Māori writers and artists who have been telling story since the first birds let sound internet page, ko te tokanga nui a noho. reverberate across the canopy of Te Waonui a Tāne. To stand on the soil at the top of Kuku Beach Road and These works are the result of the Tukorehe marae-based wānanga where Matua let my eyes follow the line from the waharoa to the sea is Keelan shared a story with us in the hope that this kōrero of land and place would lay to look at the place, the home, the location both physical a foundation, a pū, for each writer to begin conversations with. The story was told of and spiritual, that I return to hei ahuru mōwai. the construction of the original Rangiātea church in Ōtaki in 1851. Three great Tōtara Within the pages of this inaugural bilingual journal, trees were carefully cut from Pukeatua, one of the puke that surround and protect Te Whē – Te Hau o te Whenua, are the myriad Tukorehe, and that were then floated along the Ōhau river until they reached the sea.