Fire Triptych 3 

Firebird
 
 

He wanted, he said, to know how fire was made,
and did not seem to understand the answer
or to hear reply.
He sought to understand the hearth
by killing it,
for he would still deny
power that did not turn itself
to wreck its will, regardless of allother's need,
so never saw the secret that the fire always
       consumes the source which governs it.

This was our nature and the heart of all
he would deny. And so he watched us, cunningly
to see how fire was made, though no one hid from him
its source. Until he put it out. 
And even then
I found myself 
sighing, 
shaking my head 
               and loving him.
 

Go to your aunty.
       she thinks "here's Maui doesn't he look fine?
 I wonder what's his trouble, what is fretting him?" And see?
She may be tired when you've left
but you'll have given her - pleasure,
      just by being there.

Let her show off a little.
       She enjoys teaching the secret of the fire.
Well, you may sneer. You have before,
       but child, remember this,
that this same shadowy Mahuea sometimes
       fills the open world with rock,
       and hides the sun
and clothes the bush wrapt hillside
       with a cloak of living fire,
       challenges the sea and wins,
       splits the sky with sounds
which make the thunderclap of Papa's rising
 like the mewling of a newborn gull.
 

In bearing you, in giving birth, in raising you 
I am enriched.
I love you son. I love you.
Now.
    Depart from
me.

I cannot set you free, I never bound you.
But it now seems to me,
that you cannot
 be free,
so long as you so diligently
count this deadly cost
the cost that is not,
was not, never will be
 here.

It seems that you too build a universe,
out of your dreams,
as Tamahana did,
that your tight world of must and
should and
ought and
owe will one day
bind my world and call it 
               nothingness!

And you will say you "owe me nothing"
which I can myself repeat.
You owe me nothing for you can receive from me,
nothing of what I give
and ever shall.

Child.
I know you are a man.

Child.
       It seems strange to me to wonder,
when you cuddle me, to ask
               what you might want.
Always, before, I thought I knew.
You cuddle me because you want a cuddle.
This is the so-called secret of the Hearth.
Vesta and Hestia, who ever were 
what you call virgin
they called life.
The secret of the everlasting fire,
the spindle of the starry cosmos
simply this.
We are
and we are
what we are.
We receive and we give.

The wood you gave me is consumed,
you say. Where has it gone?
It is fire now. Fire
and food, warmth in the belly
burning in the groin.
It is become the muscle's life.
Food and the will to run or think.
And everlasting life like everlasting fire
is this
We love
each other.
We are become 
       one being in the warmth.
The sweet ice melts 
in mouth,
        and we are fresh.
            I melt in His embrace
       and I am warm.

You come to me, and try to rule me.
make my life less
       that your life may be
more and my heart break,
       and ask of me
               Secrets of Power.

               oh..

                             I sent him to Granny Mahuika,
Aunty Mahuea, whose sweet source
                       would nurture him.
               But did he ask?

       "Mummy says, can you lend us a little fire,
       for the hearth's gone out".
 

She must have wondered when she heard the words,
and saw that pout. But quietly and wryly
pulled her fingers with the other hand, as one who
cracks a knuckle stretching it,
and handed him her finger as it burst into a flame
and bade him
         "bear it home".

and still he didn't see, the mastery of fire, its secret sourcery
but bore the finger out of sight, and studied it and shook it
blew upon it, stamped his foot and
put it out and studied it again.

Saw,
only a charred, gnarled finger,
cooling and useless in his hand.

       So
       back he went.

 "I fell grandma, and the fire went out"

The source of earth's wild molten core,
       mother of earthquake,
       soul of heat,
told lies to by a shifty boy!

My soul's ashamed
       but she
       lifting her eyebrow
       cracked her fingers interlaced again
       and handed him a finger full of fire.

This time she held her hands up, silently,
       showing her hand,
       three finger fringed
       and lanced his black eyes with her own.

He stumbled,
       staring at the fire as if
               somehow
               the secret would
                       unpeel to him,
and fell
       into the brook that crossed the path,
       drowning the fire-filled finger
               previously.

So it went on, until at last
       "I have no fingers left"
                               she said,

and flew into the trees as fire fringed bird,
         to sing at him.

       Until he was enraged
Broke the branches off each tree she landed on
       to search them for the fire.
And when he did not find it,
       ground them
       one
       against
       the other

       bark to bark to fibre
       to fibre,
       fibre to dust,
until a filament of
               flame caught,
               wrought living lace dry leaves
       and did a fire feed.

and up he leapt.
       "Now am I master of the fire"! he said,
       and bore it back triumphantly
demanding why we made such mystery of such a
       common,
 boring
       hardwork 
               thing
and never saw

       the smouldering branch he bore was master more than he
       that which we master is the very gift of self,
and does consume us
               utterly