Still More Express It Eight Poems

Morning Glory Clouds

Morning Glory Clouds

Deep in the Australian outback
there is every spring
a wonderful natural phenomenon
the morning glory clouds
appear like magic above the land
dancing across the sky
nature at its most whimsical best
Proof that God has a sense of wonder.




Morning Glory Clouds


One of the world’s rarest and most spectacular cloud formations can be seen between September and November above Australia’s Gulf of Carpentaria. The Morning Glory is a long, tube-shaped cloud, cutting across the sky for as far as 62 miles. It typically forms in the morning during the tail end of the region’s dry season, and it is often followed by thunderstorms. The Morning Glory attracts photographers as well as glider pilots, who “surf” the wave’s strong updrafts. The most popular place for cloud-spotting is the tiny, isolated outback town of Burketown, population 238, in Queensland.

For the area’s Indigenous Gamalinda and Garawa peoples, the cloud has cultural and spiritual significance; they believe it is a source of energy that carries the spirits of their ancestors. It’s also an indicator of weather shifting from dry to wet. “It signifies a change in us for our fire practice,” Gamalinda community leader Morando Yener told the Australian Broadcasting Company. “We can start burning.”