Poliahu
from “Odyssey of Expelled Cultures”
Donna Carey
Solid place at journeys end
reflects thought
at the summit
these mountains are
your mountains
sacred at birth
when your wisdom
full grown
met ancient peaks
inviting them
under your mantle
To take residence in
spaces not accounted for
fresh
young
older than Haumea
timeless like snow
ice
older than cold
softer like emptiness
Let us speak of the void
sing songs of praise
songs of gravity
rainbows bent
of new sacraments
tablets to consume
songs of vacuum science
space pushing and pulling
gods incapable
of fulfilling
physics new structure
Architecture a
saint invented sleeping
infinite silence
infinite stream
let us speak of surreal beauty
that you fill
sing songs of praise
fertile valleys fed by your
rivers flow
luxuriant hillside slopes
sacred dews
of Mauna Kea
towering cliffs of
Hamakua
blankets of sunshine
your elegant cloaks
of white
songs of your frosty
breath reflecting the
rise of the Pleiades
depths of night
chill of inciting mystery
Fullness of space
is all we ever asked
of the gods
Poliahu
you cannot erase
collusion
that strange balance
ill conceived tipping
heard across expanses
of unknowing
On Mauna Kea we will
feel you
forged in every crystal
ablaze with memory
ice and snow seals
the memory of arrest
forgotten
each to remember
and reveal
to forever attest
beneath the mountains and
under the snows
breath of volcanism
transforms and grows
catastrophic
Pele's path
but it is your garment
containing her wrath
Born of Haumea,
You, attractor of fire
can we set you free
tame desire for the other
can we love the frost where
it crimps and sews
lick the ice streams
follow the snow
meet
where cold and heat
annihilate
fear and frenzy
jealousy and hate
obsessive longings
can we sing and dance
where divine calculation
throws reason
to a trance
Where heroes ride waves
to lands of midnight snows
blood-red moons
drip flowers of endless beauty
countless power
awakening compassionate
bastions of snow gods
inviting pilgrims
to kneel on the
prayer mat of eternity
empty and embrace
whiteness of whiteness
silver of space
Embody the mountains
become the robes
salient and pure
snow mantles of the north
eat of a powerful root
Te tumu henua
the origin of earth
the origin of all
Life appears in the world
in the void of the world
in the night of the world
form takes itself
unfolds the world
maintains the world
bends the world
Life appears in the world
unfolds the frost
maintains the fire
bends the world
wombs give birth
in the void of the world
so tranquil the time
of silence and snow
that shelters the whole
bending worlds
toward an infinite soul