Mauri Ola

Book excerpt: Mauri Ola: Contemporary Polynesian Poems in English is a follow-up volume to the highly acclaimed Whetu Moana, the first anthology of Polynesian poems in English edited by Polynesians. The new book includes poetry written over the last 25 years by more than 80 writers from Aotearoa, Hawai'i, Tonga, Samoa, the Cook Islands, Niue, Tokelau, Tahiti and Rotuma &– some living in these islands and some dispersed around the globe. Together with works by established and celebrated poets, the editors have introduced the fresh voices of a younger generation. The anthology includes selections from poets including Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, Sia Figiel, J. C. Sturm, Konai Helu Thaman, Haunani-Kay Trask, Hone Tuwhare and Albert Wendt. The late Hawaiian poet Wayne Kaumualii Westlake is represented here by a unique set of concrete poems and experimental verse. Tusiata Avia tells tales of Nafanua in different settings around the world; Rangi Faith imagines &‘First Landing'; Imaikalani Kalahele writes a letter to his brother; Brandy Nalani McDougall discusses &‘cooking Captain Cook'; Karlo Mila, eating chocolate, watches &‘paul holmes apologise for calling kofi annan a darkie'; Robert Sullivan writes against the grain; and Apirana Taylor follows zigzag roads. Ranging from the lyrical and sensual to the harsh and gritty, from the political to the personal, the poems in Mauri Ola are infused with vivid imagery, claims of identity, laments, rages and celebrations that confront again a colonial past and a global present.