Fuck I love isolation.

TE AO MĀORI | ISSUE TEN | ISOLATION

Written By Ivy Lyden-Hancy (she/her/ia) | Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Wairere, Samoan (Falefā), Tongan (Vava’u) | @tekaraipiture | Contributing Writer

Isolation is my tohunga; I’ve learned to love it. Everyone thinks it is an escape, but it is a way of being. Instead of young ho, I am an isolated ho. In a world that never stops moving, I feel like the pigeons at Brito: domesticated by concrete, trained by routine, then cast aside to fend for myself. The city feeds me crumbs of connection, but it’s in solitude that I find the last supper.

My isolation feels full. It’s a ngahere whispering through my headphones, even when nothing’s playing. You will never find me without them. Years have torn at my headphones, but the bass of my music is still as strong as the day I got them. Thank you, @loihoosi, my brother bolo, for my 18th birthday gift, a way of blocking out the noise.

When I’m gaming, I feel the same peace I find in nature. The hum of the console becomes cicadas in summer; the glow of the screen becomes moonlight on water. I’m just as happy jamming my game as I am touching grass, watching the wind move through leaves. Both are worlds where I exist. In both, I’m free from the demand to perform. I hate the idea of performance; I feel like I am always performing, but my isolation means I can stop, like a jester with a dead king.

Isolation is not always sunshine and rainbows. There was a time when it swallowed me completely. I bedrotted in Unilodge for weeks on end, only leaving for work. I disappeared into my own silence. I thought I’d stay there forever. Then came my mates on dc, James, Jess, Anfo Tony, and suddenly the silence had company. We’re a weird-ass friend group: three boys, two girls, people who weren’t even mates in high school. Now we live through screens and laughter. Fuck, I’ll love them forever. 

I work night shifts, so I go to sleep when the birds sing. I know Tamanuiterā misses his baptism of my tinana. I crawl on the walls of my skull like my tīpuna. Tracing sketches of their bones through this. My tongue is tied, and I am sleepy now that the moon has taken my ngākau. In his hands we trace the walls of my mind. Now I'm stuck inside this motion; I need air, but the waters are so comforting, but fuck metaphors. I'm tryna be in the sea like Moses; what is a world without love? I think I'm a fucking jellyfish eating away at all that is left of itself.

I hate the heat; my TV is a heater. It glows a little now, but I ignore it. My room is a furnace. Up there, where you feel closer to god I wanna run away from all I have built. Insomnia is my new comfort. I stay up coz my dreams are a repetition of my history. I am wrapped in smoke. 

Is this how Rua felt? 

Running away from himself.

Even growing up at my marae, after playing bullrush with my cousins I would hide in the wharenui, tracing the tukutuku panels, swimming through the sea of my tīpuna. The bustle of the wharekai always overwhelmed me. You would find my cousins and me hiding in the harakeke. Lowkey, that bit us in the ass coz one morning we followed my uncle where he was gutting a sheep, and later in the wharekai, I learnt where meat came from.

My favourite cousin Jean and I would run away into the chapel, running up and down under the light fixtures of stained glass. I remember running up to my koro, lying under the kauri tree. I would always say “My koro”, but he is all of our koro. 

The other day I ran away to Taupiri and sat with my nana’s, crying my ass off. I never feel alone with them. Straight up, out of nowhere, 20 goats came out of nowhere, staring at me, staring at them. One of my mates said there were 21; another said it was my tūpuna. I think they just found the jackpot of grass on my maunga.

 You would think isolation is being all alone, but my isolation is being alone with my people. I think I am a little bit possessive lol. 

I probably sound avoidant, but there is a normalisation that you need to “save” your people when they get like this. What I am trying to say is, I love being alone with my people. Do not come to save me. I don't wanna see the sun or others; I don’t wanna hear the drone of your voice. I got my community, and you got yours. I love being alone, and there isn’t even a small part of me that longs to not be alone. 

Fuck, I love isolation.

-Tekaraipiture, the scriptures of an isolated ho.