Ulva Island, Rakiura 2017

A good move says the skipper

As we climb into the wheel house.

Weather today, look out the window it’s the roaring 40’s.

47degrees south cuts clean through Waka a Te Wera.

The life jackets are stored below,

Bio security talk… Get rid of your rats.

A Weka greets us at the wharf and a Toutouwai calls us ashore.

Stands of ancient rimu shelter us from the gale

And the winds that drive the mollymawks out in the bay

Are barely felt in the filtered light below the canopy.

Kiwi hold fast here.

Saddlebacks prise morsels from under the hairy bark of tree ferns

As Kakariki scutter about on the bush floor like green rats.

I place my hand on an ancient Rimu 

That has seen the likes of me come and go a thousand times.

A textured pattern yet smooth not what I was expecting?

I’m engulfed by the experience. 

Something lodges in my throat and the hairs on my neck bristle.

I feel a presence.

The Aria of Tāne-mahuta that the Maori know so well?

There could well be a god? 

And for a brief moment.

I think I’ve just touched it.