All Those Stars In Space

I'm no poet. However, I am struck by the euphemisms cultures and traditions like Maori create to explain beliefs in death. Here are some:


Kua wheturangitia:                          He/She has been turned into a star

Kua taka ki tua o te arai:                 The spirit has fallen below the horizon.

Kua ea te Wairua ki tona haerenga: The Spirit is free to go on its journey.


When the late Rowley Habib of Tuwharetoa passed away I thought I'd try to express his passing with euphemisms expressed in poetry. Rowley was an able poet, dramatist and writer of short fiction.

Where The Sun Sets

It's true what we say 

About your star arching gently 

Across  the sky

We watch intently

Will it stop, pause even

But it arcs relentlessly on

Suffer not while you soar

Smooth the pathway light up the dark

Then drop below the horizon

At your appointed time

It matters not whose right

Missionary or us

Our own stars are in their trajectory

In the infinite milky ways of Heaven

One is you another me

And there's the horizon to another world

Beckoning where the sun sets.