Live Encounters Poetry & Writing 16th Anniversary Volume Six
November- December 2025
The legacy of colonialism in Taranaki, poem by Trevor Landers.
The legacy of colonialism in Taranaki
Watch, see him burn his eyes in the
discomfiture of substandard housing,
follow the arc of his breath,the wheeze
and rattle, his musical inhalations sing back
to him; discordant songs of rebellion, resilience.
A treasonable offence, punitively enacted,
dispossession of whenua, the land. You will
likely die before you get your super, e hoa.
Remember to smile, through gritted teeth,
emit cheery countenances as springs of hope.
His body still afire with injustice, his breath
igniting a flame, cunningly deflected:
somatisation of anxieties, the imprint of trauma.
Touch his pellucid skin, marvel at transparency,
wrestle his bones slowly transmogrified to powder,
sufferance on the floor, wet-stained with the vagaries
and vicissitudes of lost arguments, splenetic rages
the way abraded flesh stains stone, and now only a
quavering voice, given subalternity by the whims
of the poet-ventriloquist; the scent of mourning stirs
incredulous primordial griefs, the vale of tears
constant phallation & perfusions from
sucessive governments limiting culpability
evading the spirit of Te Tiriti window-dressing
short confessions of remorse & contrition.
Settlement passed, there is still the entanglements
o te karauna wheke thehead almost
indistinguishable from flailing limbs,
that incicurable Leviathan, but abutments:
resilience and resurgence, revitalisation
tino rangatiratanga, answer back in the affirmative,
a flaxroot nisus indefatiguably waged, trumps the
codification of power and privilege,
the possibilities and potentialities excite
new dawns offered with pearled promise
© Trevor Landers
Trevor Landers was born in Hāwera, Taranaki and grew up on a farm in Kaupokonui. He has tribals links to Ngāti Airani,Taranaki and Ngaruahine, thus has Gaelige, Pākeha and Maori whakapapa (geneaological links). He has been a University lecturer, National Advisor, hospital orderly, and worked in the public sector in national roles. Most recently he was the Strategic Relatonship Manager for Te Heru Māpara. He holds five Masters degrees, including a Masters of Creative Writing (First class). He currently lives in the Belgian capital, Bruxelles.