These ‘grandest flying machines on earth’, some of them with wingspans of eleven and a half feet, use gravity to get up speed and wind to glide for hundreds, thousands, of miles.
Safina seems in a sort of ecstasy as he describes what we know of this bird. which once caught the imagination of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (The Rime of the Ancient Mariner) even though he, like most of us, never saw one.
The arrival of Simba Makoni on our scene has brought a rush to the brain in several quarters.
People who did not bother to register are suddenly hurrying to do so. Everyone is talking about him. Does he have a chance? Is it all some sinister machination? Has there been some behind the scenes deal? Once again we long for simplicity in politics but are we going to get it?
We long for a straight contest on a level playing field between rivals who want to serve the public. We long for leaders who can rise above their own interest, and the endless calculations of those around them, to that of the nation.
I lay awake last night thinking of the albatross circling the southern seas in search for food for its chick. In the wind and storms, far out in the ocean this bird is at peace, master of its world.
‘And you, every bird in the sky, O bless the Lord.’ (The Canticle of Daniel)Â Â
Such a creature raises mind and heart to see the expanse, the variety and the beauty of our fragile little planet. It prompts reflection on how local our interests, our desires, can be. In about 1963 Alec Douglas Home’s mother was told that her son was to become British Prime Minister.
‘A bad choice,’ she said, ‘Ralf Butler (the other contender) would have been much better.’Â Now, there was someone who would appreciate the albatross! Could it be that in this moment of opportunity our candidates for public office could rise above calculation and take to the skies? Â
Post published in: News