Lift, lift up the south land
Upward, upward lift the south sky
Put each in its own position
There to rest for ever.
Lift, lift up Rangi
And with offering made to thee, O Rangi
We lift thee up!

Stand apart the skin
Be divided the skin
As the nettle to the skin
As the Tataramoa to the skin
Do not grieve for your partner,
Do not cry for your husband
Let the ocean be broken.

Let the ocean be far apart;
Be you united to the sea,
Yes, to the sea, O Earth
Broken asunder are you two
Do not grieve
Do not continue your love
Do not grieve for your partner.

In the beginning was Te Kore, the Nothing, and from Te Kore, came Te Poo, the Night. In that impenetable darkness, Rangi, the Sky Father, lay in the arms of Papa, the Earth Mother. The Gods, who were their children, crawled through the narrow space between their clinging bodies. They longed for freedom, for wind blowing over sharp hilltops and deep valley, and light to warm their pale bodies.

"What can we do?" they asked. "We need room to stretch our cramped limbs We need light. We need space."

Then Tane-mahuta, mighty father of the forest, father of all living things that love light and freedom, rose to his feet. For as long as a man can hold his breath, Tane stood, silent and unmoving, summoning all his strength. He pressed his hands aginst the body of his mother and turning upside down, he planted his feet firmly on his father. He straightened his back and pushed against Rangi.

The primal parents clung to each other. Tane exerted all his strength, straining back and limbs, until at last, the mighty bodies of earth and sky were forced apart.

"It was the fierce thrusting of Tane that tore the heaven from the earth," was an ancient saying of the Maori people. "So they were sent apart, and darkness was made manifest, and so was the light."

Rangi was hurled far away while angry winds screams throught he space between earth and sky.

Tane and his brothers looked at the soft curves of their mother. As the light crept across the land, they saw a veil of silver mist that hung over her naked shoulders - the mist of grief for her lost husband. Tears dropped fast from Rangi's eyes. The showers of rain ran together in pools and streams across the body of Papa.

Although he has separated his parents so forcibly, Tane loved them both. He set to work to clothe his mother in beauty that had not been dreamed of in the dark world. He brought his own children, the trees, and set them in the earth. But Tane was like a child yearning by trial and error the wisdom that had not yet been born. He planted the trees upside down. Their heads were buried in the soil, while the bare white roots remained stiff an unmoving in the breeze.

It was no place for his other children, the birds and the insects. He pulled up a giant kauri tree, shook the soil from its branches, set the roots firmly in the ground, and proudly surveyed the spreading crown set above the clean, straight trunk. The breeze played with the leaves, singing the song of the new world.

The earth lay still and beautiful, wrapped in a cloak of living green. The ocean lapped her body, the birds and the insects ran and fluttered in the fresh breeze. The brown-skinned gods frolicked under the leaves of the garden of Tane. Each had a duty to perform. Rango-ma-tane preserved the fertility of the growing things on earth. Haumia-tiketike tended the humble fernroot. Tu-matauenga was the god of war. Tangaroa controlled the restless waves. Only one of the seventy brothers left the placid shelter of his mother to follow his father. It was Tawhiri-matea, the god of all the winds that blow between earth and sky.

Tane-mahuta raised his eyes to where Rangi lay, cold and grey, and unlovely in the vast spaces above the earth, and was sorry for the desolation of his father. He took the bright sun and placed its on Rangi's back with the silver moon in front. He travelled through the ten heavens until he found a garment of glowing red. After that, he spread the cloak across the sky from east to west, and north to south.

But Tane was not satisfied. He decided that the gift was not worthy of his father and stripped it off. A small piece remained, a fragment of the garment men still see at the time of the setting sun.

"Great father," Tane cried, "in the long dark night before Marama, the moon, shines on your breast, all things sorrow. I will journey to the very ends of space to find adornment for you."

Somewhere in the silence he heard an answering sigh. He passed swiftly to the very end of the world, into the darkness, until he reached Maunganui, the Great Mountain, where the Shining Ones lived. There were children of Uru, Tane-mahuta's brother. The two brothers watched them playing at the foot of the mountain.

Tane begged Urru to give him some of the shining lights to fasten on the mantle of the sky. Uru rose to his feet and gave a great shout - the Shining Ones heard and came rolling up the slope to their father. Uru placed a basket in front of Tane. He plunged his arms into the glowing mass of lights and piled the Shinings Ones into the basket.

Tane placed five glowing lights in the shape of a cross on the breast of Rangi, and sprinkled the dark robe with the Children of Light. The basket he hung in the wide heavens. It is the basket of the Milky Way. Sometimes Uru's children tumble and fall swiftly towards earth, but for the most part, they remain, like fireflies, on the mantle of the night sky.

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