Humpback Whales
Whalers called their songs the dark liturgy of Lucifer, the grunts and groans of his aggrieved, fallen angels, echoing through the scalloped chambers of the ships.
Off Hawaii, long ago, I first heard them cry from their cathedral in the deep.
The songs bring their solitary kind together.
And together the sonic pods become acrobats, cavorting, leaping free and clear-eyed, high into the air, shaking barnacles from mottled snouts.
At times the placid humpbacks will float quietly on the smooth surface of a night sea.
Do you suppose the whales are gazing at the stars, the galaxies spinning above them in cosmic emptiness?
Madam: Archbishop Fisher (July-August 2024) does not resist the attacks on his church by the political, social or scientific atheists and those who insist on not being told what to do.
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6 mins
To claim Aborigines have the world's oldest continuous culture is to misunderstand the meaning of culture, which continuously changes over time and location. For a culture not to change over time would be a reproach and certainly not a cause for celebration, for it would indicate that there had been no capacity to adapt. Clearly this has not been the case
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23 mins
A friend and longtime supporter of Quadrant, Clive James sent us a poem in 2010, which we published in our December issue. Like the Taronga Park Aquarium he recalls in its 'mocked-up sandstone cave' it's not to be forgotten
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2 mins