“From the French, sécurité (safety or, as intended here, pay attention). CQ still means, literally, ‘attention’ but in amateur radio its meaning is perhaps more accurately described by Thomas Raddall who compared it to yelling ‘Hey, Mac!’ down a drain pipe.”
American Radio Relay League
I early liked the late-night static of ham radio,
the coded disruptions of dead air, the clicks of the key,
the metallic heat of the black, dimpled receiver chassis,
the toggle switches, the coils, the color-banded resistors,
the layered plates of the variable condenser, the plug-in crystals.
I liked, the way a boy likes, the amateurs themselves,
their radio shacks lit by dials and smelling of solder. They
were odd souls, of few words, preferring to transmit
a band of dots and dashes to a faraway ear,
and quickly moving on to the next, tapping away
the two-letter call that meant, “Is anyone out there?”