Cirrus@Austlit

'There are so many ideas in this issue that have moved me, gnawed at me and floated around in my head for the many months we’ve worked to bring these writings and artworks to you. At the time of going to print, COP26 was only a week away, so it seemed fitting to begin this issue with Harriet Riley’s ‘Climate Girls’ and an image of Bristol’s massive mural of perhaps the most outspoken one. (If you haven’t heard Greta Thunberg’s ‘blah blah blah’ speech, do look it up.) It struck me how often climate impacts loomed in this issue, whether front and centre as in Harriet Riley’s and Joan Fleming’s essays, or as a malevolent force in the background – from Ivy Ireland’s dying trees and struggling nasturtiums to Claire Corbett’s experience of being far from home in a wintry Europe while bushfire raged in New South Wales. The term ‘apocalypse’ rolls off the tongue so regularly now, but the word has a broad meaning: catastrophic destruction, disaster and endings, yes, but also revelation, disclosure, discovery. This issue covers the spectrum of ‘the various apocalypses of a life’ – tragedy, loss, illness, but also strange visions, transformations, uncertainty and the connecting power of love.' (Publication introduction)