The Edge of Things

It’s ironic I think we’ve become so keen on hearts, what good is a heart if you ain’t got fingers, the power of love without sensation...

...physical engagement, it’s all a bit rubbish a bit downwardly one sided. I love the edges where without you will never find the centre, I think that’s one of the problems we have with the Manawatu, we don’t know what our centre is.  I’m pretty sure it’s not the geographical middle, certain it’s not Palmerston North or Feilding and it sure ain’t me.

But I do think edges point us back to that which sometimes is a little difficult to define.  We are bounded by rivers, sea, ranges and big sky, and often I head to these places to look in or out from, to get a sense of place. I have spent a lot of time on and under Wharite waiting for the sun to set deep into a sea that will not boil and a night to rise from the falling light. It’s amazing to watch the huge sky fires of colour inking into diamond lit blackness, and then little by little seeing the land light up with scattered intensifying human stars, an earthly mirror of the eternal above.

To stand camera on tripod sinking in a wet sand low tide way out watching the sun set at the Manawatu’s mouth, waiting 'till the only guide to safety is a torch and a night lit Foxton Beach settlement. Or to drive up the southern side of the Rangitikei River at dawn backlit ice sparkling in the long roadside grass, long sharp fenced shadows creeping toward you, valleys opening as the sunburnt fog falls away.

The edge of things is the heart of a place to me at least, and to walk the edge takes time, effort and patience, and I often wonder if this is why we haven’t truly discovered the heart of our place, here in the Manawatu.