Page #39 & 40 of “OUT OF IT” a novel by Michael O’Leary

can’t help feel the isolation amongst all the adulation. It looks as though he is talking to his bat which is something you don’t see from many Pakeha cricketers.”


Kie te anake au
Kei te mokemoke au
Kore rawa hui ata mokemoke
Me kia au puritia koe
Taua kia haere ra muringa te haerenga
E hoki ki te whare kirikiti
Ane taku momoe mongamonga
I raro I te mana ma kaupapa
Kei ahau he poke
I roto I taku manawa a wairua
Kei te anake au
Kei te mokemoke au
Kore rawa hui atu mokemoke
Me kia au puritia koe
E taku toanga, e!

“And as the new Out of It batsman, Bob Marley, their Vice Captain, makes his way out, I’d like to welcome “Big Bird” Joel Garner from the touring West Indies side, into the broadcasting box.”
“Thank you mon! Shure does seem lika box wid a big fela like me init.”
“Big Bird, you must be pleased to be seeing Bob Marley out in the middle today, perhaps you could make some comment about his recent performance, as he is not that well known as a cricketer in this part of the world.”
“Oh, shure mon! Yano I am always alikin’ Mr Marley’s performin’. An’ he’s the one sayta Paterson one time, ya shud be a comin’ in from the carpark Hot Shot, yano, yea! So, then thatsa wot he’s doin’ an’ alla people like it, so then he just say yeah, an’ he do it, yano mon!”
“We’re just watching Coney bowl the second ball of his so far, successful over. Perhaps he’ll be out to emulate Hadlee’s hat-trick? Anyway, he won’t get it as Janis Joplin plays a defensive shot and the ball rolls harmlessly back to the bowler, who does the fielding.”
“Yes, well, Joplin has been quietly building a score. She’s been there now for four and a half overs having come in after Byron, the last victim of Richard Hadlee’s little rout of revenge and in that time she’s scored 10 valuable runs.”

From thinkin’, ta drinkin’ ta stinkin’, ta blinkin’, the P.S.M. was a kind of emotional merrygoround the Mulberrybush, it’s along way ta Tipperary an’ all! And for a gentleman Irishmightyodd – he was! But now he had the Rewi and the whiskey, and the Paul and there was talk a playin’ pool, and then there was Golly and the lollie, and talk a the girls he was far away and he knew it. This was the way they lived and their woman bore the burden, but this was on the way in good company and he could not hold back the feeling of tears and laughter. He had had the guilt all the life for doing nothing, now at least he could feel the guilt for something he had done. From the moment he had decided not to go to the work, that was the time he had fired his first blows against the empire of tyranny he has suffered under.
If it meant being an outcast, a wife and child deserter, if it meant loss of all privilage and place in society, if it meant emotional isolation, the loss of his woman’s love, and spiritual damnation then so be it, that’s what it meant – another dram me boys, and the P.S.M. drank like it were beautiful stream of conscious life givin’ water that it was…..

“Yas mon! it shure is a pity that Bob Marley lost his wicket I thort he was lookin’ pretty good there. He hit himself a six, then four and then well mon, if I hud ma way I’d just say shure is a pity. I’m sayin’ it may be da herb or it may be da rum