Stuart Clarke recounts an attempt to catch an emu...

On how to catch some food,

And to prove it was fair dinkum,

I would try one, though it seemed a little crude.

Emu steak is very nice, so this was the one to try,

First to find some emus and then go into the act,

Emus are very curious and will come and take a look,

And if I was to catch one I really needed the knack.

I came upon a likely mob grazing on the plain,

And when I was close enough the ritual was to start,

On my back upon the ground with my legs raised in the air,

I pedaled like upon a bike or horse in an upturned cart.

The emus came to have a look at this poor bugger on the ground,

I kept up with this artful demonstration,

While the emus one by one came closer and closer,

I only had to grab one for the steak to be my creation.

At last one came so very close, I think to peck my eye out,

I grabbed him by his scrawny leg,

And this caused a huge commotion,

Dragging me across the flat like an empty keg.

No way I was going to let go and let this legend be false,

To grab the other leg was all I had to do,

And wrestle the emu to the ground,

I could already smell the aroma of some emu stew.

The emu tore across the plain,

It was more difficult than I thought,

As I got dragged through seed and burr,

I began to think this really was a rort.

Straight for a fence the emu headed,

I thought this is where I will down him,

But with feeling possessed it went straight through the fence,

Leaving me hanging from the barbed wire with gashes from every limb.

Thank goodness someone found me and had me all stitched up,

Although suffering from embarrassment, I believe this legend to be true,

Because in the land of the Dreamtime,

There were no fences to run into.

The film Oppenheimer provides an opportunity to reflect on some history and look to the future. However, an important Australian aspect was omitted.

A year before the Manhattan Project was established two physicists, Otto Frisch and Rudolf Peierls revealed to the eminent Australian physicist Mark Oliphant in London that an airborne atomic bomb, previously thought too heavy, was in fact possible.

It was not until Oliphant flew to America and met with Oppenheimer that the London work was taken seriously, and bomb construction was undertaken.

From 1946 to 1996, the US, UK and France detonated 318 nuclear devices in the Pacific region including Maralinga in South Australia.

The Maralinga tests failed to adequately consider the presence of the Anangu Pitjantjatjara people. A delegation of Maralinga survivors and relatives recently visited Canberra urging the government to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

The treaty was adopted in 2017 with the backing of 122 countries. Six years later, the treaty has been signed by 95 state parties and ratified by 68.

While Australia is not one of these, in 2018, the Australian Labor Party adopted a resolution committing it to ratify the TPNW in government. It was moved by Anthony Albanese.

For the sake of young Australians already concerned about climate change, ratifying the treaty is one way the government can send a signal of hope for the future. It must be done.

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