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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 9, Issue 8 (November 1, 1934)

The Dreamer

The Dreamer.

Hine-ruaki-moe the dreamer,
Daughter of sleep that is endlessly troubled,
When wilt thou rise from the arms of Te Kore?
Fettered in darkness she hears not—she dreameth
Of Tu the avenger, the red-belted fury,
The spoiler of pahs, the fighter, the bruiser,
Consumer of Tiki, devourer of tears
Of the desolate women, dishevelled, lamenting
For warriors fled to the hills of Reinga.
(Ever the knife-edge sinks in the furrow,
Ever the delicate breasts of the mourners.
Are flinted and fluted with red-lipped sorrow.)
Is there no dawning.
No light in this darkness, no swift resurrection,
No rich swelling song on the silent tongues
Of the formless phantoms drearily drifting,
Caught in the curtain obscurely veiling
The ages unborn, the shadowy domes
Poised in the starless depths of Te Kore?
The grey mist swirls, the sleeper stirs:
Her dark hair drips with the dews of pain.
Her eyes half-open; she calls in vain
The mystical name of the child that is hers.
“Te Ata, Te Ata, why dost thou linger?
Long have I sought thee, star of the morning!
Save me, O save me, from Tu the destroyer,
Tu of the small face, mocking and gibing,
With eye-sockets circled with blood of the slain.”
The white mist with its clammy breath
Laps the uneasy sleeper round—
And still the dark void holds no sound
Save the low mutterings of death.
Hine-ruaki-moe the dreamer,
Daughter of sleep that is endlessly troubled,
When wilt thou rise from the arms of Te Kore?