A PLACE TO CELEBRATE
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NEHWYREVE
SUNDAY OCTOBER 22 2023
Courbet described the painting by saying:
“On one side is an old man of seventy, bent over his work, his sledgehammer raised, his skin parched by the sun, his head shaded by a straw hat; his trousers of coarse material, are completely patched; and in his cracked sabots you can see his bare heels sticking out of socks that were once blue. On the other side is a young man with swarthy skin, his head covered with dust; his disgusting shirt all in tatters reveals his arms and parts of his back; a leather suspender holds up what is left of his trousers, and his mud caked leather boots show gaping holes at every side”
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https://artsopen.com.au/
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ELECTION DAY 2022
NJARALI
(Smoke From Cigarettes)
Galarrwuy Yunupingu
GOBULU
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2002
2012
Darkness at Midday
So I've waited here - all year
To say goodnight to a year past;
and good morning to tomorrow.
Asleep then awake not dying;
To find that Emoh Ruo's virtual reality
is a blinding white lie; not a real estate.
Australia
This perfect place a bonfire of self love
now running on empty; soon spent.
Paying tithe to a new year coming;
back rent due as a poisoning ash
falls softly upon all of you
Ouroboros
This zombie serpent in a continental desert:
A living dead reminder of a childish greed for life.
Now when fools poets and priests defer to politicos -
To lead the peoples' heart to sanctuary and hope -
They find entanglement in a maelstrom of petty strife.
Envoi
No angels but innocent ghosts haunting my sleep
As a frantic dream of tomorrow my soul dares keep.
Though I can find no simple rhyme or reason
Summer in Australia is now its saddest season.
AfW
February 2020
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Once upon a time a bird flew it’s sub-urban nest
Embracing life’s imperative to always do it’s best
Wending a way north then south – east then west
Artfully avoiding death’s challenge to end his quest
To discover alas any horizon’s empty promise of rest
ANZAC DAY 2022
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AmW
October 13 2021
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O QUAM MIRABILIS EST
How wondrous is the prescience of the
divine Heart,
that foreknew every creature!
For when God gazed into the face of the
human being whom he formed,
he beheld all his works,
in that same human form, entire.
How wondrous is the informing breath
that awoke mankind in this way!
HILDEGARDE VON BINGEN
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CANTELOUBE
Songs of the Auvergne
Soprano
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By all accounts MMXX was a dark year ~ but for AfW not without moments of dazzling illumination.
Perhaps perversely for many – for AfW certainly – a year in isolation provided a welcoming quarantine after some years of a delightful rambling exile – the guttering light of a life lighting a heroic pathway out of the banal Necropolis, social responsibilities and gilded middle class mediocrity blazing a rusted staircase to heaven.
Joan provides a made for one crevice in the World Rock. A grotto to call home. A not uncomfortable metaphor for rebirth the always been the always hoped for endgame of the decade-long Fool’s Journey MMX ~ MMXX that saw him age LXVII~LXXVII.
Bought by his children in December 2017 the Worker’s Brick Cottage 1865 has slowly been modified to have reliable wifi – some enhanced resistance to challenging weather patterns – and the Gazania and rock decked dirt footpath outside the front door is doing well.
A good place indeed to finish his time on Earth. Somewhere, his Tazmanian father Jeff, dead at LX probably dreamt of – somewhere perfectly situated between the police station and the catholic church.
His end holds no mystery for him. Now with more parts of his body missing a beat than he can be bothered spending the time fixing. Life like ebbing waves surmounting a childhood sand dyke – enough effort has been spent defending and restoring. Time now to stand back – breathless hands on hips, watching – not waiting – for the inevitable that is to come.
Much more engrossing than concerning it is the super nova he gets to watch and considers himself privileged to be awake, and onstage for the final curtain.
A new studio house rises on the hill behind Joan – a Palace on Knossos. Soon grave goods will be moved into its ark – A final resting place for Anthony Frederick Ward – who still chooses to live his life as a story from an Empire Boys C’mas Annual Circa 1958.
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“To romanticize the world is to make us aware of the magic, mystery and wonder of the world; it is to educate the senses to see the ordinary as extraordinary, the familiar as strange, the mundane as sacred, the finite as infinite.”
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SELLING BILL
W.D. (BILL) WILLIAM HAMMOND 1947- 2021 WAS BORN IN LYTTLETON NEW ZEALAND
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BULLFINCH’S MYTHOLOGY
The Age Of Fable
1855
THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF OUR TEARS
Fig. ! ~ A Lacrimatory Vessel
Kalymnikos Issos (Dance from Kalymnos)
CASTLEMAINE2020
IN SPRING
Beauty’s curse not hid at all
Catches a voyeur’s attention
Like the kiss of bat and ball
WHERE
Ancient ferals glean forlorn
Upon the manicured strips
Of verdigris suburban lawn
SUMMER IS BORN
Silver crested one vain galah
Avoids the still chill shadows
Muttering winter’s last hurrah
HERE I AM
Still erect in this twilit world
An aged cock rooster stands
Sentinel memories unfurled
THE SONG IS
Magpies carol a bleeding sky
A siren’s rousing fanfare call
Distracting me – a wanton eye
BEGINNING
Rains will bring orange dust
A balm to his once hot blood
It’s bouquet of summer lust
AGAIN
His ourobouros seeks its end
A peau douce hold on reason
Allowing that rules may bend
AfW
October 2020
12 NICHOLSON STREET SOUTH YARRA
June 1968 – July 1973
FICUS
94 EDGEVALE ROAD KEW
1979 – 2017
2010 ~ 2019
Home are the haunted ;
home with their kill…
At Noojee June 2019
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On February 19th 2019 AfW returned to Australia from [Sarawak];
parenthesising a decade of his Narrative.He was 67 and is now 76 and not much wiser for the [mindmiles] traveled.
“I’m coming Penelope..! “
… he said, pulling on his overcoat.…he said dragging on a MonteCristo, a gift from his son on his last 69th birthday.…he said while thinking only of the [Moreau] he stumbled upon…in 1974.
…in 1974.
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AfW
At Noojee June 2019
Anthony Frederick Ward?
Old Man By Moonlight ~ Noojee (2018)
1990 ~ 2009
Autumnal Digression
[Not-A-Haiku]
At Noojee June 2019
One – probably Easter – Autumn day the boy asked,
“Why is it so hot in Summer and Cold in Winter?”
“There’s a dragon in the forest,” he was told.
“What’s a dragon?”
“A really big lizard that breathes fire.
Like a Tyrannosaurus Rex …
..with flame coming out its mouth…
It sleeps through Winter…”
“Like Godzilla”
“Not Japanese!”
1982 ~ 1989
Melbourne ~ Khrungthep
At Noojee June 2019
BO – “There’s a job here if you want it.”
TW – “I’ll drop in on my way to the UK.”
BO – “If you timed it for the O&M Christmas Party
you could meet [Khun Sunandha.]”
TW – “OK’
OK!
1973 ~ 1981
How Great Thou[Self] Art!
At Noojee June 2019
The only [truefootprint] we could discover for this late 20th century hunter gatherer is in the forest of the [worldmind].
1964 ~ 1973
A Terse Interdependence
At Noojee June 2019
Faced with [selffreedom] to create according to his own plan the Author followed a preordained path unknowable to him at the time; defined, guided and illuminated by Choice – Chance’s [harlotsister] and Random – his [FirstLove].
Iteration is an end in itself
At Noojee June 2019
SELFSATISFACTION + ITERATION = EDUCATIONIs [SELFSATISFACTION] the highest or lowest possible human achievement or more or less increasingly absent from core [worldhumanity] altogether.Observing Jacky hitting himself on the head with an iron bar a passing squatter intervenes – Why are you hitting yourself over the head poor man – ?Because him feels plurry good Boss.
Stop !
1956 ~ 1963
This boy!
At Noojee June 2019
“This [daydreamer] has grown up seeing the real world as 45 dpi screened images overprinted with a bloody spot colour Stop-Press garnishing a gritty black ink smear on newsprint. The unforgettable darkness of the Hiroshima Panels or the pin-up-able forever autumnal Woman’s Weekly gravure. He understood that the job classification of [print devil] was a real option and had by three years old identified hydro carbon vapour as one of his favourites. And soon after that the fragrance of synthetic raspberry, dark chocolate, vanilla ice cream and a banana milkshake. Underwritten by a persistent base note of floor wax on boards. An Evening in Paris avec Marveer…
1943 ~ 1955
You Bastard!
At Noojee June 2019
Joan and Malcolm were engaged in 1939. Malcolm died in 1939. Joan was 21.
Jeff and Joan were married in 1941. Anthony was born in 1943. Joan was 25.
Joan was diagnosed with dementia in 1970. She was 52. Joan was sectioned by the police in 1970 after a disturbance at Alpha Street She was found to be intestate, declared a ward of the State and her estate attached by the State.
Anthony visited his mother once when she was in Larundel in 1970 with IH but not again until 1976 at MontPark with AM. In 1978 the Joan’s diagnosed early onset dementia resulted in her death from pneumonia .
Joanie was 60 years old. A detailed chronology of events immediate to that dark day can only follow facts yet to be revealed. Imagination left alone arrayed naked on hot wire can only define a misery that is Grief.
Who called the police to 1 Alpha Street Nth Balwyn?
Was it a bottle of milk or a steak knife?
Call D~24 ?
The Noojee Guanyin Noojee June 17 2019
Noojee Hash Noojee June 17 2019
In the late 90’s – early
noughties -Tony Ward (AfW)
measured Photoshop 4 against
the day of Family Ward
and Swinburne @ Prahran
in digital postcards.
20 All New Types
1840
There Was A Crooked Man And He walked a Crooked Mile, He Found A Crooked Sixpence Upon A Crooked Stile.He Bought A Crooked Cat, Which Caught A Crooked Mouse and they all lived together in A Crooked Little House.
2009
The Longest Age passed and to all not he; River Time flowed seemingly straight A to B
Fates shared; Sun gilded threads coalesce ornate – Splendorous and Gorgeous; one thing obdurate.
‘Bah Humbug’… he declared with a sigh.
Life’s straight line’s quite crook’d to my eye!
2017
Born with the capacities
not the strength
to be a Good Man
Grasping tools and flesh
he fashioned idols
as a Useful Man
Learning
through mundane works
how to be a Caring Man
Finding at least
in the promise of his children
a Better Man
Kneeling at the edge of The Forest
sated being Every Man
Bathed in life’s lastlight
he can at last smile
a Happy Man
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Noojee October 2018
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It was early winter in 2018 and he had returned for his birthday from that other place.
Maybe in another life or parallel universe – he had been there before… But the absolute certainty of what he saw and recorded was familiar and he would return.
Going for a walk into town early one morning of a five day stay at Annie Horner’s off Greenhill with AZ – he’d stepped through the back fence knowing he would come out near the first corner in Green Hill in from the main road.
He recognized the cottage almost hidden behind the Agent’s sign by the road – but from down hill he knew it for the first time.
ASW discovered it independently on a Real Estate site and we did return to it while the sale sign was still on it – and thought about it…
It was a trip to Tasmania – his first since 1946 – also with AZ.
On a side trip from Hobart to Forcett the car for a moment pierced the membrane that enveloped his past and he knew he was seeing what his father saw.
m Forcett Cemetery Tasmania June 29 2016 at the grave of James Ward 1818 ~ 1885
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My motto is: Contented with little~Yet hoping for more.
Charles Lamb 1775 -1834
A PLACE TO CELEBRATE 
October 11, 2019 at 10.05 |
I knocked but thought that you were no longer home. I just wanted to leave this under the door, so after resetting my wordpress account and clicking all over the place I’ll try again. Just a Super 8 transfer from my not very high res home scanner. Needing an edit, music (suggestion?) before I show it to everyone
https://vimeo.com/365662499