OLGA presents
LISTENING FOR THE BIRDS - ten collaborative etchings by John Pule and Gregory O'Brien
4 - 13 December 2015
Over the past five years, John Pule and Gregory O'Brien have worked on a series of collaborative etchings which are at once a conversation about, and a meditation upon, the South Pacific. The images in this exhibition were inspired by time they spent on Raoul Island, Tongatapu, Rapanui (Easter Island) and in Chile.
Images of the etchings will be viewable here.
The etchings were etched on zinc plates then editioned by master-printer Michael Kempson at Cicada Press, University of New South Wales, Sydney.
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Poems by Gregory O'Brien
Whale Years - Poems from Across the Pacific for Phil Dadson - South West Pacific Ocean-sound, what is it you listen for? L’Esperance Anchorstone, sea urchin waterlogged instrument, tunes a shrimp whistles. Rekohu/Chatham Island If there is a moon it is carved into a dark tree. If there is a tree. But there is always an ocean. Orange supply, Raoul Island Bird rattle of a cyclone-tossed greenness ever-decreasing orchard. Tongatapu Your eyes were canoes, your brows outriggers, your hair a wind-tossed palm, and your bones an ocean-polished whiteness. Orongo, Rapa Nui Easy on the oar Steady the sail Hold the thought Let go the hand Easter Fracture Zone In the book of the ocean each wave is recorded, but the lives of men are left where they lie. Pulmeria rubra, Tongatapu (a frangipani for Alec Finlay) aFter spRing cAme aN anGular musIc Piano Accordianist fiNgering everythIng Quintay, Chile Everything I heard or did not hear: the ocean peeled back, wave by wave, sigh of a once whale-laden ocean. Tongatapu An ocean never dropped a fish. The day’s first lesson-- 'A Quality Education for Now & Eternity'—at the Ocean of Light School, Nuku’alofa. ~ Just beyond a billboard advertising Rising Sun Beer uncertainly, dawn flickers. Hanga Roa, Rapa Nui It is written. The chickens of this island laid only blue and green eggs. It is written a large wave came for them. It is written. Kermadec Vast continent of every tilted or rolling thing—eyes and teeth of implausible fish, stars and planets on their undersea orbits. Southern Pacific Ocean Arms and legs of the plundered sea, for whom is it you dance? Rekohu HIGH SEA LOW LAND LOW SEA HIGH LAND LOW Raoul Ghost shark, anvil, kite starboard, wind- ward, my childhood on Raoul Island sustain me. Pest eradication programme, Tuhua With the last rats and mice and the drinkers offloaded at South East Bay the Cruising Club buried, conveniently in a landslip all we now count on: the numbered days of the numberless wasps of Mayor Island. In advance of an oil slick, Bay of Plenty Light and colour are we are told collisions. How then in the absence of both, mid-night, mid-ocean the MV Rena on course for Astrolabe Reef? Oneraki Beach, Raoul Island Unbreaking rocks Broken sea Unbroken sea Breaking rocks Waiheke Island Water Supply On lancewood and five finger twiggy coprosma and lemonwood, rain and the memory of rain and the persistence of all that is not rain but upon which rain falls. Sunrise, Mayor Island Obsidian fish glittering in its red bucket. Isla Negra, Chile Telescope tree what do you see? Hummingbird what have you heard? Obsidian Headland, South East Bay When the tin hull strikes the glass headland the island rings like a bell. And the boat, also perfectly pitched. Westerly over Te Whanga Lagoon, Rekohu Great tongue, speak now or forever enfold us in ribbonwood and matapo indigenous flower forget me not forsake me now. Off Mayor Island A school of kahawai the educated eye’s encylopediae. Kermadec Trench Were there words to inscribe in this blueness lines for the placation of a storm god delirious mathematics of the deep, every living thing with which the ocean is awash. Quintay, Chile Mariners can read the ocean as you would a book, each wave the upturned corner of a page. Pitch In the fallen nikau forest, a tui in two halves, two halves of a song, sung. Tuhua wave-sharpened headland, headland- sharpened wave Te Whanga Lagoon STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL STILL ECHOING ECHOING STILL Star of Bengal Bank Everything overheard or lost from hearing: song of coral palm and one-eyed urchin, chapter and verse of the Isaiah-fish, bird- burrowed sea in which we dive down and are retrieved. That which light enters so as never to leave. Oneraki Beach, Raoul Island I was raised by rocks, but not as one of them. Upended by storms, I was raised by nikau palms, but I was never one of them. I was raised by waves-- the waves talking, always talking to themselves, always listening-- and raised as one of them South East Pacific Ocean-sound, what is it you listen for? |
Poems by John Pule
RAPANUI i Neruda called you the Separate Rose. I remember his poems to describe the saddest part of your body; your hair was a petal of red and your eyes petals of blue and your mouth green as the isla de pascua. He found that a stone crushed the first handshake between agitated locals and nervous visitors; guns fell from foreign hands and solitude followed sooner than expected. You could not comprehend the new fragrance that men brought to your attention in the night when the bible was at its brightest so you fled to the insides of a volcano and, learning why your land, your gods were cut up, heads strewn around, buried, smashed faces, could not find what you were desperate for: a heart. ii Te Pito o te henua If this is the pito, where is the ure? Where is the manava? Where is the ulu? Where is the tau lima, tau hue, and where is the atevili? On Land ( Tonga ) for Karlo Mila Our motel in Mau afa is situated opposite the fish market every morning I eat fat juicy kina every morning the sun wants to over shadow what the moon showed me every morning I lift my feet up to make sure im not standing in the sea that I haven’t brought back from the Kermadecs spilt plasma, or nutrients from the bluest clouds mixed with the soil of a different country I feel the white cells gurgling in the bone marrow of another land: all the nations of Polynesia is connected by sea and never by the idea of the American lake never, never, never, never below my balcony is a family spreading a huge ngatu on the lawn every night I feel the blood of ancient sediments spreading through out the islands carried by winds, storms and in the hearts of emigrants who only wanted to follow the pathways of the first great Polynesian explorers wanting simply to go elsewhere Tomorrow We Leave-Raoul island tomorrow we leave this island a tree was planted on my tongue it grew to encompass my entire world I ate a cloud I ate an ant I had an aversion to eating bats because the pea’a is a rat on the bodies of men who eventually took flight with the wings that belonged to the bat who was deceived who was lied to by the rat to loan its wings and never came back so the pea’a is about embellishment of truth of deceit between the bat and the rat and who can tell the best bullshit story Island Song ( For HELAVA ) The moon is not a shark the sky is not a mountain and that hibiscus is not an ant and that door is not a bird the cloud is definitely not a ladder the road is a simple petal and that leaf is really a cup and that bread is a guitar so let us pray that dream is really about your hair and that happy room in your eyes is only your hands releasing tui into a sack of wheat to become one beautiful ocean Canto Pia - Liku It was here at Pia that I lived for two years. Two mango trees were planted at the same time. Tasted my first talo, saw my first sun, got a whiff of cars and the dispenser of foreign goods like postcards from that country I will eventually draw my inspiration from. I must have ate the soil as well, as my poetry was born inside of me about then. I knew I had birds lingering around my mouth and my eyes, same as Tagaloa’s, knew the salt of swimming in a mother’s stomach. Born in the afternoon during a hurricane, behind the minister’s house, in view of the crooked path of blighted hymns that found my ears attuned more to the sea, I will never know where my father hid my pito, nor could my mother remember as she nearly died to push out the bones of what a poet should be. Pito-Liku If you were born at the same time as my mother’s birth and you weighed the same as the Tuaki, its wings already in the Lalolagi, in your cavity I will install constellations and my feet takes root as a way to prolong my stay to gaze upon you my small and wild pito Hawaiki Birds - Niue some are leaving and some are dying orchestral memory of wings to Hawaiki and back again this is where I shared my first language with the sea bones of sharks scattered around the fekakai tree what you were born with jumped onto the next cloud to watch the dreams of my tongue expire my passport issued at the same time as the first light bulb piercing the air just as the beautiful Hina lulls to sleep the sea that you must eventually step into across the windows of churches painted blue in the sky we will not recognize your mouth the compass & the perfect flight south Great World- Raoul Island I kneel before the sea bow to drink nutrients at the first gulp instantly I knew my genealogy the sea is an enormous giant in my blood to stand in the sea long enough with stones as anchor the transfer of salt into my veins oxygen from the citrus trees that want to fuel my life The sun opens the heart and the moon closes it Polynesia is the great Va My Life When I try to sleep, my tongue walks away with the ants. I taste their sugar. I try to leave with the sun. I wanted the glow from your eyes to show the way but the moon said: Im not the sun. I make a last attempt to dig through my ribs to find avian cells in my lungs. If I could find wings in my left ventricles I’d lift a war-torn country to heaven. Helpless to alleviate the rising saliva of misfortune I try to eat the remains of a hospital. What if there was that one god out there to look at my maps and say: I know where you are? Could I then wait for the sea to soak my tired hands tired of holding you tired of waiting exhausted Above the Pacific Ocean towards Niue, 8/4/2015 over the pacific ocean over the small clouds the blueness of air my feet already rooted the soil still in my finger nails the vegetation already in my mouth the rocks in my arteries pathways cleared at my birth kafika as a spine at the coast I eventually go as I wait for the sun as my other name is spelt with insects long ribbons of sweetness stories that wait for my time return to the first time of my life Aotearoa The sun will never find my hair all the birds ever wanted was to eat my tongue I lost my arms in the Spring-time let me lift this siale to that cloud an angel can determine its colour you may bury your eyes in this earth you may let me paint your mouth green you may let me walk to heaven a country that is a small saliva I’m a sad juvenescent road I want to speak only the truth that ships of Polynesians all broken at the spine all issued with photographs of paradise all walking into Tamaki Makau Rau |