te pāhikahikatanga/incommensurability by Vaughan Rapatahana Flying Islands, 2021.

Australia has sat passively too long within the English-language regime. Many peoples elsewhere have to be relatively fluent in four or five languages for daily use. In poetry festivals across the globe you will see an audience listening attentively to a poem read in Walloon or Lakota eagerly comparing it to their home country’s language translation. We have never had a true international poetry festival.

Proudly against the trend is Flying Islands Press. These stylish pocketbooks have seen work emerge in a range of languages and te pāhikahikatanga / incommensurability is an invaluable addition to their catalogue.

Rapatahana’s focus rests heavily on language – he argues it can be an oppressor and a liberator. Language matters. In 2011 I was performing at a festival in Ukraine. On the first night I went onto the stage and said good evening in Ukrainian. It got an immediate standing ovation — I think you can guess why. This book is written in English and Māori. Akin to live performance in multiple languages one can look at the poems in the first language and admire their eloquence as the lines dance across the page.

He looks at English with a mixture of anger and contempt. It is an imposed language, inseparable from the colonisation that brought it to Aotearoa and continues to play a part in the alienation of Māori from their culture and land. English is rightly identified as a “Hydra”.

That dualism becomes clear in the English translations. The voice ranges across a spectrum from what is close to hip-hop

our language was stolen
our land was stolenour lot was stolen
…………………………………………………so the theft continues

to a layered complexity

all that remains
is this arrhythmic
obsequy
an irregular
trebuchet
…………………………………………………no primogeniture

but always that frustration and anger

fuck
I can’t exist………….in………….this
……….……..language
any
……….……..more
…………………………………………………he whatinga

Rapatahana sees his poetry as part of a broader mission of education, liberation, restitution and recognition:

it is my job
to write about the past
and the many bad events;
to face this intense darkness;
the real void.

 

So that we can all              

witness the dawn
of a new world.
………………………………………………..the void

It’s interesting to note this poet lives in three different countries but he always focuses back to his “skinny” country… its land, the spirit and its people with very real grievances/problems/strengths:

home for many tribes
with many anxieties
and
a refuge for many anxieties
without a tribe
………………………………………………..Gisborne

This is a book of activism but rarely descending to a point of diatribe. There is nuance that fills in a painting of the land and its people (again three-dimensional) — celebrated but

ours’ is a nest
of conflicting birds
doing their best
to soar in
a similar direction
………………………………………………..britain in the south seas

Not an easy book to read… this Pākehā is left rightfully uncomfortable while at the same time made more certain that the future Rapatahana is looking towards will be attained.

 – Les Wicks

 ——————————-

Over 45 years Les Wicks has performed widely across the globe. Published in over 450 different magazines, anthologies & newspapers across 36 countries in 15 languages. Conducts workshops & runs Meuse Press which focuses on poetry outreach projects like poetry on buses & poetry published on the surface of a river. His 15^th book of poetry is Time Taken – New & Selected (Puncher & Wattmann, 2022).

.

te pāhikahikatanga/incommensurability by Vaughan Rapatahana is available from https://flyingislandspocketpoets.com.au/product/te-pahikahikatanga-incommensurabilty-by-vaughan-rapatahana/