The Many Puna of Kūmarahou

Originally written after sitting with kūmarahou many years ago, this reflection has been revisited and deepened as I return to her through another flowering season.

Joanne Hakaraia sitting with flowering kūmarahou in her maara

Kūmarahou moves through a myriad of hues. With every change in colour, she shifts in being. Her āhua changes—and something within us may shift with her.

Each change opens a different puna.

I experience these puna as energetic openings: doorways into different frequencies, different states of consciousness and different ways of knowing. The colour of each bloom carries its own vibration, almost as though it has a sound. When we sit with that frequency in reverence, it can stir something within us—a memory, an emotion, a message or a deeper insight waiting to be received.

This is why I return to kūmarahou throughout her flowering rather than sitting with her only once. A few days later, or perhaps a week later, her colour has changed. Her buds have become more hapū, gathering mauri as they prepare to open. She is no longer exactly as she was—and neither am I.

Each sitting becomes another doorway.

The longer we remain within each puna—observing it, feeling it and gently unravelling what it awakens—the deeper we can travel within ourselves. Kūmarahou does not reveal everything at once. She opens one puna and then another, inviting us to enter each one with patience and reverence.

Before she flowers, kūmarahou begins quietly. Her buds gather close. As they develop, their colour deepens and changes. They appear hapū—swollen with potential and filled with mauri.

She continues gathering her energy until, finally, she can contain it no longer.

Then she bursts into bloom.

Her flowers become the most glorious, sun-filled yellow. She does not arrive quietly. She waves in pure joy, calling from the fullness of her being:

“I am here! I am here!”

It is almost impossible to look upon kūmarahou in full flower without feeling something awaken within you. She stirs our natural desire to express ourselves. She opens the throat and invites the voice to sing. Perhaps this is why we want to sing with joy when we see her in full bloom.

Her otherworldly colours remind us of who we are beneath all that has silenced or constrained us. She encourages creativity, expression and the courage to become visible.

Within rongoā, kūmarahou has long been associated with the lungs, the breath and the clearing of heavy mucus. Her leaves are intensely bitter, yet her teaching reaches beyond the physical body.

When I sit with her, I experience her opening the heart and lungs, helping held emotion to move and creating space for the breath to deepen. She reminds us that expression is also a form of release. When the channel of the voice becomes clear, something within us can breathe again.

Kūmarahou thrives in clay-rich, nutrient-poor whenua where other plants may struggle. There is mana in the ground she chooses.

What might her relationship with clay reveal about the body—and about our ability to draw strength from difficult conditions?

She carries the mauri of a pioneer. Where the whenua has been exposed or disturbed, kūmarahou can be among the rākau that return to cloak Papatūānuku. She does not wait for perfect conditions before revealing her beauty.

This small, spritely and mighty plant invites us into our own puna of expression. She helps us recognise what has become blocked, what is waiting to move and what within us is ready to be voiced.

Observe her before she reaches full bloom. Return to her as her buds change colour. Watch as she gathers momentum and grows in mauri. Sit with her through each opening rather than waiting only for her final display.

Perhaps you, too, are gathering.

Perhaps something within you is changing colour, changing form and preparing to emerge.

Kūmarahou reminds us that there is a time for quiet formation and a time to stand in the fullness of who we are—to lift our faces towards the light and declare:

“I am here.”

I encourage you to sit with her throughout her many puna. Allow her transformation to accompany your own. Connect with her mauri, and may her beauty touch you on every level.

Arohanui ki a koe,

Joanne

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