Waitangi poems on Hello Poetry

Kristen Falzon Feb 2013

blizzard

a thrill to my bones
a stud in my nose
a piano jam
he can't eat ham

sometimes it rules
believers are fools
a religious twist
i'm an anarchist

we stopped making sense
despite our diligence
the phone rings
your manner stings

where are you now?
i've searched every cloud
it's blue, it's close
the cat sleeps in boats

scotch on the rocks
it can't read clocks
we ride, we shake
the mug is at stake

"wine and dine"
"me and mine"
the future holds
a sadness untold

the explorer naps
for sheets: his maps
the falcon clutches
it is what it is

celebrate Waitangi Day
a sea away
or maybe three
I don't know.
This stopped making
sense to me.

break the form
glue it with salt
heart smart cookies
1 cup dried cherries

i need you more
she needs it now
it's busy still
hopping on clouds

i searched and searched
to no avail.
the hungry husky
barks and wails.

Ryan O'Leary Jan 2020

*Laura Clarke

We can change history
miss Clarke, it is easy,
just re-write the lies
your historians wrote
about the early settlers
in New Zealand, which
if you had any respect
for, it would be called
Aotearoa, the official
Maori name. Tell the
world about your nations
attempt to eradicate
native Maori and what
is written at the base
of the Obelisk on One
Tree Hill by Sir John
Logan Campbell.

*Laura Clarke is the British high commissioner to New Zealand

<>

Campbell, like many European New Zealanders of his generation, had expected that Māori would gradually die out and that an impressive memorial would be a most fitting symbol to perpetuate their memory.[19] By the 1930s this had obviously not happened, and some considered the term "memorial" was inappropriate with many Māori objecting to its use. During construction of the obelisk, a suggestion was made that it should be described as a centennial tower to mark the centennial year of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi and not a memorial.[19]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/02/heres-why-the-uk-wants-to-strengthen-its-relationship-with-new-zealand-maori

Dom Felice Vaggioli The Italian priest who's book on New Zealand was banned by Queen Victoria.

matthew scott harris Dec 2021

Bar none, no shortage of soap shampoo, nor detergent

Courtesy food pantries
Saint Eleanor's Saint Mary's,
Our Daily Bread,
the missus and yours truly (her spouse)
well stocked with good n plenti of
soap, shampoo and detergent.

Spongebob squarepants
would be in seventh heaven,
where sudsy clouds (resembling
Mister Krabs, Plankton,
Sandy Cheeks, Squidward, et cetera),
would drift across celestial vault.

Gratitude bequeathed to prophets of virtue
benevolent good samaritans
who trend righteous true
to the calling of helping hands who renew
faith (mine) in goodness of humanity
assisting not only yours truly
and the missus, but people
from South American country named Peru
or even indigenous tribes
accorded recognition comprising
population of inhabitants occupying New
Zealand, offered reparations

under the Treaty of Waitangi,
a process of reparation allowed
Maori to be fully recognized
at political level in lieu
of unfair practices inflicted upon
original occupant loosely similar
to descendents of long lost tribes of Israel,
endowed with (pure tin) pride
wishing I too could call myself proud Jew,
nevertheless attraction manifests destiny
(mine) someday to learn Hebrew.

Courtesy atheism more so Unitarianism,
I need not adopt
an explicit dogmatic, fanatic, humanistic...,
lunatic, narcissistic, puritanic... paradigm,
but only tout poetic justice (mine)
to recognize laudable traits
linkedin to orthodox faiths,
albeit rationalistic rubric
that caters to selflessness

for no other reason
than allowing, enabling, and promoting
random acts of kindness
without any forthcoming great expectation
downplaying remuneration,
no matter destitution begot mein kampf
hard times living within bleak house
slight hyperbolic exaggeration
poor as a cheesy church mouse poet.

Lemme coast to a fitting conclusion
bringing reasonable rhyming blather
originating courtesy me noggin,
within which wool doth gather
thus I a halt and
dial down philosophical lather,
cuz most likely
ye dear reader would rather
experience palmolive oil slather
preparatory to full body massage.

Marshal Gebbie Jun 2023

Burden of Proof

In religion proof of God is the adversary of faith.
The faithful claim that to seek proof of God proves only... "That ye are of little faith"!
Proof is, in fact, the enemy of faith....and to claim that you have found
absolute evidence of proof of the one God, sets you up as an implacable adversary to 99% of the world's established believers...for they believe only in THEIR God on THEIR terms.
Not YOUR God on YOUR terms.
Your claim would most certainly proceed to undermine and/or nullify their authority and diminish their influence and rank in the realm of their sphere of universal belief or agnosticism.

Imagine the reaction of the Roman Catholic Church, the turmoil caused in the scarlet clad robes of the Vatican?
The Freemasons would be compelled to rewrite their tomes.
Jews writhe, viscerally, in their Synagogues.
The atheistic Communist Chinese may even release the assassins in order to ameliorate the claimed heresy from the very face of the earth.
Some followers of Allah would convulse in screaming outrage and, in cannoning their noisy AK47s into the void, would point the accusation of blame at the infidels of the world and seek immediate covernance of the fury of Islam through Jihad.
Putin would wear a thoughtful expression on his face, shake his head, then assign the entire matter to the hands of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Maori elite would claim cultural reference to it all in the Treaty of Waitangi.

One thing is certain, should this revelation be put to humanity the universal reaction will be one of dubiety, doubt and skepticism.
Extraordinarily few will take the proof of God on face value.
For every single individual has his or her own barrow to push and it will take an extraordinarily spectacular global demonstration available, simultaneously, to all of mankind to even begin to achieve BELIEF.
For sane reason alone, shall not foot it....and you can't believe everything you read in the newspapers....can you?

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ

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