Launching ‘Still Is’

On Friday 21 June, the National Library hosted the launch of former Poet Laureate Vincent O’Sullivan’s last poetry collection Still Is, published less than two months after he passed away in April.

Book cover of Still Is (Te Herenga Waka University Press, 2024).

The evening was a heartwarming celebration of Vincent’s life and career, with contributions from Vincent’s family and those who knew him well. Te Herenga Waka University Press’ Fergus Barrowman shared lively anecdotes that highlighted Vincent’s wit and talent, shedding light on what it was like to work closely with him for 40 years.

I was honoured to be asked to read at the launch alongside former Laureates Bill Manhire and Jenny Bornholdt, and poets Gregory O’Brien and Diana Bridge who all spoke movingly about their friendships with Vincent. We each read a poem from Still Is as well as one of our own poems to complement Vincent’s. I wrote a new poem for the occasion in response to Vincent’s poem ‘The Trouble With Windows’.

Subtitles missing

Lately I have become untethered from stillness.
Here, in my little brown house caught in the shadow
of a neighbouring tower block, every room
rattles my patience. The tui and the sparrows
frolick at my kitchen window. I have never been
able to read their intent. I watch my neighbours
watch the day go by, each window a screen
of unquiet resolution. I feel as if we are
collectively haunted by some outdated expression
of freedom because the day is a dream we dream
when we have no other way to take flight.
On this side of the glass the view is idyllic
and industrious: every car on the motorway
is a passing vignette and every container ship
works against silken blue. Across the harbour,
the Eastern ranges remain staunch in their place.
Time collects on the wind, unbothered, while
my attention divides and scatters itself again
and again in search of an elusive synchronicity.
My imagination’s fieldnotes are entirely made up
of subtitles for every window I look into or
out of. Nearly all of them are questions, like
‘How can we prove what never occurred?’
and ‘What waits for us on the other side?’.
Like daybreak, the tui and the sparrows reappear.
They ask for so little. A lesson, surely, given
we are prone to asking for what must be earned.

— Chris Tse

Chris at the Still Is book launch and reading. Image credit Marcelo Duque Cesar.

Wonder: Poets Laureate at the National Library, an event held in association with the exhibition Mīharo Wonder: 100 Years of the Alexander Turnbull Library on August 6th 2021

A flock? A laurel wreath? A vine? A stanza? A chapter? A library? What collective noun might best define an assembly of Poets Laureate? Such national figureheads of the art of poesy-making are generally considered rugged individualists to be prized for their distinctive poetic voices, for their various 'ways of saying', rather than their harmonious concord.

New Zealand has had twelve poet laureates since the Laureateship was established by prime mover John Buck of Te Mata Estate Vineyard in Hawke's Bay in 1996. The badge of office for each of Aotearoa's Poets Laureate is their own tokotoko. The matua tokotoko or 'parent' orator's talking stick is held at the National Library Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, which became kaitiaki or guardian of the Laureateship in 2007, with Peter Ireland acting as facilitator.

The attending Poets Laureate and friends in front of Cliff Whiting's 'Te Wehenga' mural. Back row L to R: Brian Turner, (Wendy Buck), Bill Manhire, Selina Tusitala Marsh, (Peter Ireland of the National Library), Jenny Bornholdt, (Jacob Scott), David Eggleton,  Front row L to R: (John Buck), Cilla McQueen, Ian Wedde, Elizabeth Smither, Vincent O’Sullivan. Photo Mark by Beatty.

All the tokotoko thus far have been carved and fashioned by master carver and artist Jacob Scott (Ngāti Raukawa, Te Arawa, Ngāti Kahungunu), in consultation with the poet. Each Laureate receives their tokotoko at Matahiwi marae near Havelock North in Hawke's Bay. In a way, then, these customised wooden talismans might serve to suggest a single 'poet-tree' growing out of the land.

The large audience being welcomed to the Poets Laureate event by Rachel Esson, the National Librarian Te Pouhuaki.
Photo by Mark Beatty.

And so a tree of singing birds, a lorikeet-like flurry of laureates convened at the National Library in Wellington on Friday August 6th to mark 25 years by raising their tokotoko in the air and shaking them together in unison, while reciting Hone Tuwhare's poem 'Reign rain' — or almost. Michele Leggott and C.K. Stead couldn't be there, but Selina Tusitala Marsh, Vincent O'Sullivan, Ian Wedde, Cilla McQueen, Brian Turner, Elizabeth Smither, Jenny Bornholdt and Bill Manhire, along with myself, took part in the evening's celebrations, which included poetry readings expertly conducted by Master of Ceremonies Gregory O'Brien in the acoustically-resonant auditorium.

The occasion was also distinguished by the launch of a poetry chapbook in a limited edition of 100, hand-crafted by master printer Brendan O'Brien of Fernbank Studio in Wellington. Throw net: Upena ho'olei — a suite of poems from Hawai'i consists of nine poems drafted by me in various notebooks when I held the Fulbright-Creative New Zealand Pacific Writer's Residency at the University of Hawai'i in Honolulu towards the end of 2018. These recently completed texts are accompanied by woodblock prints produced by my brother Tonu Shane, an artist who formerly lived in Hawai'i and taught at Windward Community College in Honolulu, and who now lives near Mendocino on the coast of Northern California.

Cover of Throw net: Upena ho'olei — a suite of poems from Hawai'i

I am extremely gratefully to Brendan and his helpers for all his hard work and the time involved in putting this exquisite publication together, from the actual letter-press printing, to the hand-sewn binding, to the choices of ink colours and textures, to the careful sourcing of high-quality papers from various places. And I would like to thank the National Library for enabling this project to happen. Images are below.

All in all a lambent occasion, highlighting contemporary New Zealand poetry, and ending with libations of fine wine and a raise-your-glasses toast to the history and the future of the Laureateship, proposed and delivered with a Falstaffian flourish by wine-maker and legend John Buck.

Throw net: Upena ho'olei — a suite of poems from Hawai'i

Below are images of the poem Throw Net and the woodblock that accompanies it in the book Throw net: Upena ho'olei — a suite of poems from Hawai'i  hand-crafted by master printer Brendan O'Brien of Fernbank Studio in Wellington.

Image of the poem Throw Net printed by Brendan O'Brien.

Woodblock print that accompanies the poem Throw Net, produced by my brother Tonu Shane.

the book

posted by Michele

Keely O’Shannessy’s cover design

A local launch for MIRABILE DICTU took place 24 June in the Devonport Library with around 140 people present. We kicked off with Selina Tusitala Marsh’s ‘Samoan Star-chant for Matariki’ in blackout with drum and drone backing. Then the lights came up on 23 children (ages 6 to 10) from Stanley Bay School who read their Matariki poems to the enthusiastic crowd.

Selina calls the stars

Some star poets from Stanley Bay

Then it was time to launch the book and Peter Simpson gave it a good shove out into the stream. His launch remarks are reproduced below (thanks Peter). The proceedings finished with a performance of ‘keep this book clean’ that included projections of the smoking-enhanced illustrations in our ancient family copy of The Story of Doctor Dolittle, an excerpt from home movies of Urenui days and a rousing singing by all of the first verse of Me He Manu Rere. It was a great night and thanks are due to the Michael King Centre, the Devonport Library Associates and the Devonport Community Coordinator Maire Vieth for their generous support and organisation.

AUP publisher Sam Elworthy introduces MIRABILE DICTU

Peter Simpson launches book #7

Peter Simpson’s launch speech, Devonport Public Library, 24 June 2009

It is a real pleasure to be invited to launch Mirabile Dictu, the seventh book by my friend and colleague Michele Leggott. Seven is an auspicious number, I believe; at least dwarves, samurai warriors and the seven brides for seven brothers seem to think so, and what poet isn’t into numerology. Writing poetry used to be described by (was it Keats?) as “lisping in numbers”, and I don’t imagine things have changed all that much. Poets like counting; always have, always will. Readers familiar with the previous six of Michele’s books, and I imagine that counts for many people here, might notice some subtle differences this time round. Her previous books, well five of them anyway—Journey to Portugal is a special case—all had a distinctive square format, and all are exactly the same size, obviously deliberate. What’s so good about square, then? Well for one thing, it allows poems to have long lines without curling over the edge, as for example in famous early poems like, “An Island” some of whose lines were all of 30 syllables long—three times as wide as a sonnet. And having gone square once, it was easy to stay square so that all the books lined up prettily in a row, like peas in a pod. But not this time. Mirabile Dictu is both taller and thinner than its brothers and sisters.The thing about poetry, as we all know, is that nothing happens by accident; every detail of word, phrase, line, page is a matter of choice; it’s there for a reason. And the new format of Mirabile Dictu is no exception. It’s there for a reason.

Now, I haven’t spent the amount of time with the poems you’d need to analyse this carefully, but it’s obvious just flicking through the pages that Michele is favouring a shorter line. Take a look at the opening poem, “work for the living”; nearly all the lines are shorter than a pentameter and most are six or seven syllables: same with the last, “more like wellington every day”, and most of those in between. This is not exactly a new voice, but it’s a sign that Leggott is on the move, the lines tumble on top of one another, and into long juicy paragraphs, and further into page after page. None is a as short as a page, many are two, three, four, five, six, even eight pages long, and the pages pile up too. None of your 48 pages, 56 pages, or 62 pages of her first three books. You’d have to add those three together to get a book as big as this one. 154 pages, no less, the size of a novella. Clearly this is a woman who’s got a lot to say, and she wants to get on with it, briskly stepping it out line after line page after page.

Of course now that she carries the big blue stick, Te Kikorangi, of the poet laureateship, she can seize the occasion, command respect, order us to lend her our ears. I think this laureateship has been a benefit to Michele. I think it has given her confidence, a strong sense that words do matter, if we choose the best ones and put them down in their best order as she does, line after line page after page. I sense this new assurance in the poems, they know we are going to be all ears, hanging on every word, even if it takes three, five or eight pages to get to where it’s going. And speaking of coming and going, I’m struck by what a mobile collection this is. It’s always on the move—now up North, now down to Taranaki, or Hawke’s Bay, now in New Brighton, now in Rome, then Florence, then Venice, then back to more familiar parts: Rangitoto, Whatipu, Day’s Bay, Ohakune. The very first poem in the book is a car journey north, with a bunch of poets for company, heading for a funeral (Hone Tuwhare’s as it happens). The last poem in the book is also a journey by car and train, this time for a wedding among the olive groves. Two journeys—one north one south, one to a poet’s funeral, the other to a family wedding. Hey, this is not coincidental, this is deliberate, she planned it that way. And these two poems slyly introduce us to one of the big themes of this book, which we might describe as the family of poetry, and the poetry of families. We meet dozens of poets in this book; one whole poem is devoted to the north shore tribe, from Robin Hyde to Mary Stanley to Jack Ross, and heaps of others show up, John Newton, Bernadette Hall, Lord Byron, Walt Whitman, Rilke by the Spanish Steps in Rome and Ezra Pound on a gravestone in the cemetery Island of Venice. Poetry itself is never far from the topic of conversation, due no doubt to the challenges and opportunities of the big blue stick. And as for the poetry of families, that is present in this book in spades, as Michele searches family archives to put her mother and father and aunts and great aunts onto the page, often in their very own words, in a wonderfully moving series of poems.

Perhaps I could end with reference to just two more poems; The title poem “mirabile dictu”, and the one whose title is a translation of that phrase, “wonderful to relate”. The counters among you will not fail to notice that “mirabile dictu” is the third poem, while “wonderful to relate” is the third to last. Perhaps we can think of these two as the “Il Penseroso” and “L’Allegro” of John Milton’s pairing. “mirabile dictu” is a descent into darkness and blindness, loss and death, “looking into the eyes of my stone bird”; “wonderful to relate” by contrast, relays the miraculous discovery of what was lost, a daughter, and shows us a family ecstatically reunited in a wedding; a scene of comedy and fruitfulness like the end of a Shakespearean tragicomedy such as The Winter’s Tale. These two poems, the descent into a lonely world of darkness and despair; the entry into a scene of reunion and joy, establish the polarities between which this wonderful book moves, with its great richness of character and scene, and the tremendous verve of its language. It is a book worthy of a laureate: the big blue stick has spoken. Open your purses and buy!

Credits
MIRABILE DICTU cover courtsey of AUP
All photos by Maire Vieth