Nā koutou i tangi, nā tātou katoa.

FEATURE | ISSUE FOUR/20 | RONGOĀ / DRUGS

Written by Ivy Lyden-Hancy she/her/ia |Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Wairere, Samoan (Falefā),

Tongan (Vava’u) | @tekaraipiture

When you cry, we all cry.

Intergenerational drug harm within Māori and Pacific families is a collective systemic inequity shaped by colonisation and poverty. Substance use in Indigenous communities is strongly linked to historical trauma and the ongoing impacts of dispossession. For many whānau, drugs become woven into the rhythm of life. When drug use becomes normalised across generations, its effects ripple. Shaping childhood experiences in ways that can limit how young people imagine their future and what they believe is possible for themselves. Growing up in a community surrounded by drugs meant learning early how to read the signs. It meant watching whānau drift between moments of clarity and clouds of addictions, loving them unconditionally while losing them to substances that reshape their body and soul.

Going into tertiary education feels like stepping into a whole other world. Entering university means leaving behind siblings, parents who still battle addiction, and even running away from their own addictions. This cycle of harm means carrying guilt for escaping the constant pull from home. The ability to navigate two worlds reflects a form of cultural intelligence that Western institutions overlook. 

Despite these challenges, Māori and Pacific students continue to succeed. Their presence in tertiary spaces is an act of resilience against the systems that once sought to limit their futures. Their success disrupts the narrative that people from low socioeconomic communities will not succeed. There, my journey was for my family and for all those from places like Papakura.

My poem Nā koutou i tangi, nā tātou katoa reflects this intergenerational struggle and captures the emotional landscape of growing up surrounded by addiction. I am grateful to have grown up with a strong solo mum who refused to continue the cycle and started a shift toward people doing better for future generations. 

The intergenerational issue of drugs in Māori and Pacific families cannot be understood without acknowledging the structural forces that shape it. Its impacts on young people are often ignored, creating a generational cycle of people running away for a better life. Those who are in tertiary education demonstrate that healing is possible, cycles can be broken, and education can be a lifeline. As my poem reminds us, when one person cries, the community feels it; and when one person rises, the community rises with them.

Nā koutou i tangi, nā tātou katoa.

When you cry, we all cry.

My mātua 

are blends of ice and tissue. 

My pāpā plays dice with the masses.

His eyes rarely meet mine, 

every blink a roulette clinks

in the back of his eyes.

He dances in the clouds,

I sacrifice the world to see his smile.

My māmā has the eyes of a warrior,

the softness of papatūānuku. 

Each beat of the drum

building like fault lines,

each stream of lava is a cry for the Moana. 

My mātua can’t meet my eyes,

losing themselves in them, 

I know they're proud.

A soft pat on the shoulder,

or a call from god? 

They live through me as I live for them.

My siblings are a bracket of a song on repeat,

each one growing bigger than their shoes.

Each drip of their tears,

used as a waiata,

meeting from hand to hand,

too heavy, or 2 heavy. 

My brother is my shadow; 

we speak with our eyes.

Our mātua split on the iceberg of a human body,

but my shadow streams through train lines. 

For I wonder how his ribs crack between the fault lines. 

Do I give to him as Tāne Mahuta gave to me?

Will you feel the tide,

as my tears pour for things I can not change?

Will I become a memory in my baby’s mind? 

I feel the shells break with every tiptoe,

the smash of a glass footpath to walk on. 

Will the world feel my presence the way I feel it?

Will they trace the freckles of my mata?

Each dot is a constellation for the stars 

for I understand now.

That to heal is to feel life 

in all its glory. 

Will my body ever stop shaking

when I see the blue taniwha?

Eyes red and flashing,

will I remember it as my curse or my saviour?

My mātua built me into the mānuka tree,

taught me to set the world on fire before I could them.

No hea koe?

I am from the roots of the tree,

where the bugs lay to rest,

I started from a mānuka tree.

One day, I will be laid to rest under a kauri tree. 

The dirt will fall on me. 

The rain will soften.

And I will be with my whānau,

playing in clouds of ice,

with a shadow, 

a hand, 

and a drum.