{"id":174,"date":"2012-07-10T12:36:48","date_gmt":"2012-07-10T00:36:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/riemkeensing.wordpress.com\/?page_id=174"},"modified":"2012-07-10T12:36:48","modified_gmt":"2012-07-10T00:36:48","slug":"the-poet-is-seen-flying-across-the-manukau","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/?page_id=174","title":{"rendered":"The poet is seen flying across the Manukau"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>(For Bernard Gadd)<br \/>\nWinner of the inaugural Bernard Gadd Memorial Poetry Prize, 2008<\/p>\n<p>Now in this season of stars [Matariki]<br \/>\nand new beginnings, I&#8217;ve fashioned you<br \/>\nwings [manuka, flax, toetoe]<br \/>\nas if for some marvellous bird<br \/>\nsoaring in glorious exultation of wind<br \/>\nabove the wide waters of the Manukau.<\/p>\n<p>Your great white plumes thrill in jubilation [toetoe]<br \/>\nas you swoop to the gold tipped dazzle of waves.<\/p>\n<p>From your vantage points you see old lava flows<br \/>\nand quarried-out remains of ancient cones no longer<br \/>\nletting off steam or fireworks to thrill on a winter&#8217;s night.<br \/>\nNothing here is a flat surface.<br \/>\nEven stones rise out of earth to make enclosures<br \/>\nand walls against whatever might disturb.<\/p>\n<p>I see you soar upward and out towards the entrance of the harbour.<br \/>\nA latter-day Daedalus on your way to a fertile shore.<br \/>\nAs your wings beat, flax-seed pods are loosened by the wind.<br \/>\nThey tumble then right themselves on the water, small waka<br \/>\nsturdy with treasure. Shoals of shining fish push them up-stream<br \/>\nagainst the tide and beach them in the inner reaches of your local creek &#8211;<br \/>\nWaokauri. Here they will open and grow<br \/>\nand once again become<br \/>\na forest of poems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(For Bernard Gadd) Winner of the inaugural Bernard Gadd Memorial Poetry Prize, 2008 Now in this season of stars [Matariki] and new beginnings, I&#8217;ve fashioned you wings [manuka, flax, toetoe] as if for some marvellous bird soaring in glorious exultation of wind above the wide waters of the Manukau. Your great white plumes thrill in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":9,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-174","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/174\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/9"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensing.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}