AT RISK

Oak Flats, NSW, Australia

Stir crazy, frustrated, trapped in a cage, these were the humble days when all of longing was compressed into a single stream, and as always he felt a desperate yearning, for nothing, for everything. He slept a lot, in his life almost invariably a sign of depression, and walked through so many streets, as if there was an answer when there was none. All of it could be seen at once. All could be managed. All could be walked through. There wasn't any way out of this. His shoulders ached. Still haunted, still desperate for something else, he kept walking and walking and all the streams came through in the darkest times; splashing like lava on a blackened shore. He culdn't find his way out. He culdn't see who was standing there. He couldn't stay asleep, unconscious forever. And so all that had happened, it just curdled into a pointless dream.

He should have used this time to be away. He should have seen things coming when he didn't. He should have fled long before they had time to pursue him. He should have heard them, when there was nothing to be heard. There were pontless dramas. The cafe he liked in the morning, with the Vietnamese, was shut for a fortnight. The time he should have chosen to be away he had misunderstood, and so was trapped in bleak rituals. He had never wanted to be here. He had never wanted to come back. So when he chose his humble, uneventful little days, doing this and that and quiet things, he bowed down before God. The endless talk of Satan droned on through the elderly woman's house, God, God. A God with an American accent. Devotees spread in isolated dollops across the planet surface; patient, ancient, crucified.

He was irritated now by the silowness of things; just wanted to be free. Instead he thrashed on the surface and beneath the waves; all astern, the wash frothing. They would come and convince him there was something greater to do. As if every mistake made brought a brighter light. Instead of a restless night. Instead of salvation and furniture; a balance that he did not have. A crushing recluse, a silence, a retreat. Where no man could find him, where anger had been surpassed. He was coming to the realisation... Well, there had been too many. Yes, squirrels ran along branches in the morning light, still, sometimes, but he wasn't writing for echoes, he was waiting for the wheels to turn. And instead, getting up and going to work everyday. As if the glorious maxims, the flashy displays, the quet pain, had vanished into a grimier, more pointless purpose.

Where were the flashes of beauty, of inspiration, of a soaring, liquid desire which took in the entire universe. It wasn't here, in these quiet streets, in abandoned routines. They could laugh as much as they wanted to. They had paid their own price. Yes, he knew that. All was well; and then again, not well. Because his own dislocation, lack of a base, a home, still ate at him. He needed to be his own person, and now was not. Trapped in a place he did not want to be.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/newslocal/northern-beaches/a-baby-whale-has-died-after-being-entangled-in-a-shark-net-at-mona-vale-beach/story-fngr8hax-1226744269050

A BABY whale has died after being caught in a shark net off Mona Vale this morning.

The calf's mother and four other adult whales remain in the vicinity.

The baby humpback is understood to have become entangled in the net in the early hours of the morning and was spotted from the shore about 6am.

After authorities were contacted, staff from the National Parks and Wildlife and from ORRCA rushed to the scene to try to disentangle the calf.

ORRCA volunteer Shona Lorigan estimated that the calf was no older than three months, and about 6-7m long.