'Tuna mau seeps'

My eyelids flicker, your frame echoes the sun, our sun that we look at with closed eyes, the moment of opening colours divide, distorting my view.

Waiatarau's park Te Rimutahi sits dressed by human with subtropical exotics, nestled in the over coat of innercity suburbs.
Waiatarau. Your songs rise up. Silent. From the ground as I walk, silent. I hear nothing. I feel everything. I feel your songs. Your songs are silent. I hear nothing. I hear everything. I feel your song. I walk with you singing, we have races down the slides, you always win. We laugh, we play the guitar with our tennis rackets. We laugh, you pretend to be the mum and call me a name that's not my own, I smile at you with tears and wonder what your grandmother would see in you. You laugh I smile. I feel the lines on my face now.

It’s autumn and the waxeyes are travelling around the gardens in big busy groups feeding on what's left of the flowers from summer. The trees are bare and it surprises me how many birds live here. Kingfishers still come, even though the bays sparkling waters have been covered and the eel creek drained generations before you became my home. The sun lies low, and gold spreads over everything, sending our shadows far across the field behind us. Light shudders.

Tuna mau seeps.
Hands have covered you, hushed your gentle breath. Tuna mau, who was buried alive long ago. Tuna mau seeps. Choking quietly. Heaving rhythmically upwards your pulse pushes. Tuna mau seeps. Seeking air, yearning for light. When Tuna mau seeps tears, the ground becomes soft underfoot and my shoes get wet.

- Layla Rudneva-MacKay