As a poet from Te-Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa, as a womxn and younger sister in poetry to Serie, I approach this review in the same reverence that she has with her collection, with alofa/love. It is my responsibility as a sister of the moana, to uplift and honour my fellow moana poet’s words. So let us begin this review with Serie’s own words:

people skirt my grief

avoid me

don’t be afraid

I’m not a fish hook

warmly hug

release me

I’ll swim again

Pasifika poet Serie Barford invites us to join her upon a malaga grieving the passing of her beloved Alain in her latest offering, Sleeping with Stones. A malaga that traverses the many faces and shades of grieving whilst also providing us gentle instruction on ways to love upon a loved one that is grieving.

Naturally, many people know grief to usually sit hand in hand with fear. Within this collection, Serie’s poetry takes us through this malaga using alofa as the tool of navigation. The mapping of the collection into the four seasons provides the reader a sense of safety and knowing of phases through a heavy and often feared subject matter. As you approach each season, your five senses are activated to create within your mind's eye and the bed of your heart the environment in which you will receive Serie’s exploration through each season. An example of how beautifully caring and considerate she is towards her readers, Serie tenderly balances the tension between holding care and being truthful to the bone:

grief is a fist of whirling mussel shells

slicing

scraping

shredding what remains

Within each season there is a sense of shedding to a conscription of time as linear - for who indeed can put a timeline on a grieving process?

The poems ebb and flow between an internal curling up of oneself towards the pain and longing, to an expanding of oneself to the external elements seeking company and stillness. Within these, there is space for anger to exist, anger at the reasons for the loss. Sacred reasons.

Often, the poems conjure up how the environment and natural surroundings are conversing with Serie throughout her journey:

I heard high-pitched squeal

imagined a bird in distress

rushed over slippery bridges

into grass heavily rutted by tyres

equine necks straining a wire fence

alerts me to tragedy

a hedgehog newly drowned in mud

beneath their sorrowful gaze

I tried to resurrect the warm stillness

As we weave, dive, swim, duck, are swallowed and resurface to float again throughout this collection, the reader is reminded that time indeed does not wait for anyone. That even within our own grief and ache and moments of joy, the seasons will surely still come whether we are ready or not. But through it all, Serie still manages to plant hope in each poem.

Sleeping with Stones reminds us that the malaga of grieving for a loved one only exists because of great alofa. Alofa that is tangible and transcends, between tā and vā / time and space. Alofa that is alive and breathing.

Moana (body of ocean). Alofa (love). Malaga (journey). Tā and vā (time and space).

Reviewed by Grace Iwashita-Taylor