KAPAI: The beauty of a butterfly mirrors a monarch's soul

Monarch butterflies have always fascinated me. They represent the undeniable and absolute beauty of mother nature.
As long as I can remember, the monarch butterfly with its colour combinations not unlike the Omanu School and Waikato rugby jersey, had its own pace and grace that commanded respect by virtue of knowing you never needed to touch it to verify its majestic regality.
So it is and was with a most special monarch who carried herself so regally and so royally with an aura of impeccable grace among her Maori people for the last 40 years.
Dame Te Atairangikaahu, the sixth ordained leader of the Kingitanga movement, or "The Lady" as she was affectionately known, has laid her wings to rest and will fly no more among her people as their beautiful butterfly.
This has been a week of silent sadness for Maori and for New Zealand as their longest serving leader has passed away, heading home to the far off shores of Hawaiiki.
Many knew her and the whaikorero (speeches) spoken in her honour have been a legacy that will live on in tribal whakapapa (history) up and down the land that has been covered in a white cloud of mourning.
Dame Te Atairangikaahu didn't choose her title of Queen. She was born in to it as are most monarchs who are born into the traditional system of hereditary leadership. Many ordained leaders were born around her birth year of 1931, such as the kings of Belgium (1934), Norway (1937), Thailand (1927), Spain (1938), Emperor of Japan (1933) and the president of France (1932).
They say Dame Te Ata didn't make a big noise like some leaders because she didn't need to. This diminutive woman of mana had a special wairua (spirit) just like the monarch butterfly, that made you feel special in her presence. That is how I felt when I first met her in 1994 when I hosted her at our national Maori Tourism Awards, an organisation and an industry she supported throughout my stewardship as chairman.
She had a gift for understanding the essentials of an argument and then adding to it. Her understanding of tourism as an opportunity for Maori to celebrate their culture was visionary - as were many of her beliefs and aspirations for her people.
It was once quoted that: "She is the leader of the people she is following." That was true.
Many stories have been told this week of engaging Dame Te Atairangikaahu in a conversation outside a fish 'n' chip shop, inside a $2 Shop or alongside the din of a few free spins at the "marae in the Sky".
Wherever it was, this Ariki (chief of chiefs) understood the voice of her people and the heavens opened every time she smiled back at them. It was the same smile that a mother would share with her child to reassure them along life's rocky road. On her road of royalty there were some rocky moments, especially when she was first crowned Queen. Not all tribes supported her coronation but Dame Te Ata earned the respect of all tribes and unified Maori as no other leader before. Wherever the queen's colours are raised today, as they are here in Tauranga Moana marae during the annual Poukai celebrations, there is a sense of kotahitanga (unity).
It is kotahitanga or unity that could well be Dame Te Atairangikaahu's legacy.
As she said when visiting her close friend the King of Tonga for his 80th birthday, "I would like my two children Heeni (51) and son Maharaia (42) to carry on after I cross to the other side so the unity grows, because indigenous cultures need to get closer together otherwise they will be overwhelmed by the rest of the world."
All Nanny Piki - as she was warmly known by her family - ever wanted was for people to unite together for the common good of tomorrow's generation, something she achieved in life and now in death.
A tall kauri has fallen to the forest floor.
A true leader, a people's queen and a follower of the Pai marire (peaceful) people's religion has been called by the lamenting karanga of God's awhi angels.
Just like the magnificently beautiful monarch butterfly, this Maori monarch has flown home and I will see her face in the beauty of every butterfly from this day on.
Today on her mountain called Taupiri, by the riverside she called Waikato, near her town named Ngaruawahia and beside a boy called Billy T, Dame Te Atairangikaahu, the monarchic mother of Maori has been laid to rest
Haere atu ra
Pai marire - sleep peacefully beautiful butterfly.