Saturday City
I am going to Saturday city in my mind today it’s 84 degrees c I am going to put on some electric high powered makeup that tells the time I am going whack on a silver dress and pop some pants on my ears and eat the moon for lunch I will get to Saturday city in my river rocket ship shape ship if it dose not brake down
Over and out Kermit the frog
Over and out Kermit the frog
Clive James- The After Life- An Open Essay Anyone Can Come In, Especially If They Have Free Hair Pieces
I have always been too much of an over educated, bald, self- confessed cynic to ever explore the concept of the afterlife. Quite apart from the fact that I have not even commenced packing my luggage for this ever lasting journey. I unfortunately do not own enough clothes or undergarments to seem through eternity, let along staying power. In spite of this I have to admit that if I ever wans to be reborn I relish the idea of returning to earth as a finely carved creature blessed with the looks of Errol Flynn and the mind of TS Elliiot. I loved the way Elliot produced literary gems like running water although at my age that can come at any tick of the clock.
Over the years I have been somewhat fascinated by pop cultures various attempts to tackle the notion of the afterlife. How can one forget John Lennon's famous line "Imagine there's no Heaven". I have no doubt that if Lennon had been born into medieval times he would have been burnt at the stake, however, in saying that I have no idea if Lennon Liked steak i the first place.
In conclusion, whether our lights go out or we meet our maker at the pearly gates of Eden, all one can hope for is that we have made the best of our life's work. This philosophy applies to any living thing no matter what culture you belong to or what spiritual belief belief you hold.
Clive James 2018 AKA Joel Barraud
Over the years I have been somewhat fascinated by pop cultures various attempts to tackle the notion of the afterlife. How can one forget John Lennon's famous line "Imagine there's no Heaven". I have no doubt that if Lennon had been born into medieval times he would have been burnt at the stake, however, in saying that I have no idea if Lennon Liked steak i the first place.
In conclusion, whether our lights go out or we meet our maker at the pearly gates of Eden, all one can hope for is that we have made the best of our life's work. This philosophy applies to any living thing no matter what culture you belong to or what spiritual belief belief you hold.
Clive James 2018 AKA Joel Barraud
Tribute to Morag
You were once a hard nose, classy lawyer with an air of sophistication and grace, at the same time you possessed an acid tongue of pure poison.
When someone peeled back the layers of your hidden grief and pain, you went on the attack, firing slander at great speed. You showered them in an emotional agony and anguish to protect yourself from vulnerability.
You shied away from Summer Bay, because it shed you of your shell and exposed your weaknesses and fragility. You hid behind your own belief that the communal intellectual level was beneath you. You did this because coping with he reality of your mistakes was too painful.
You were furious with your illegitimate daughter,, because you saw her as an irritating creature who has the audacity to interrupt your legal career and destroy your marriage. But at the same time you could not bare the though of killing her, and carried her to full term.
You tried to help people, but your methods were grossly misunderstood. You seemed to have trouble cutting through your sophisticated persona and expressing your true feelings.
You put up too many walls, in the later years these walls came down.
You defended many citizens of summer Bay, with grace and dignity. You exposed miscarriages of justice, with flawless accuracy, and saw evil traits where others could not. You saw humour and irony in situations that escaped other people.
Towards the end the silver tongued heiress you once were began to mallow, although there were still traces of it from time to time.
You valued the importance of family later on, an came to realise that money, education and societal status were far less important than blood connection, love, and emotional maturity. Your second husband Ross exposed your softer side, your caustic side diminished.
In your first marriage, you married for professional status, although you did love Richards dearly. But you seemed to lack the emotional intelligence to tell him. Academia was your world. In your second marriage, you married Ross for genuine love. May you rest in peace.
When someone peeled back the layers of your hidden grief and pain, you went on the attack, firing slander at great speed. You showered them in an emotional agony and anguish to protect yourself from vulnerability.
You shied away from Summer Bay, because it shed you of your shell and exposed your weaknesses and fragility. You hid behind your own belief that the communal intellectual level was beneath you. You did this because coping with he reality of your mistakes was too painful.
You were furious with your illegitimate daughter,, because you saw her as an irritating creature who has the audacity to interrupt your legal career and destroy your marriage. But at the same time you could not bare the though of killing her, and carried her to full term.
You tried to help people, but your methods were grossly misunderstood. You seemed to have trouble cutting through your sophisticated persona and expressing your true feelings.
You put up too many walls, in the later years these walls came down.
You defended many citizens of summer Bay, with grace and dignity. You exposed miscarriages of justice, with flawless accuracy, and saw evil traits where others could not. You saw humour and irony in situations that escaped other people.
Towards the end the silver tongued heiress you once were began to mallow, although there were still traces of it from time to time.
You valued the importance of family later on, an came to realise that money, education and societal status were far less important than blood connection, love, and emotional maturity. Your second husband Ross exposed your softer side, your caustic side diminished.
In your first marriage, you married for professional status, although you did love Richards dearly. But you seemed to lack the emotional intelligence to tell him. Academia was your world. In your second marriage, you married Ross for genuine love. May you rest in peace.
The Sun Rises
the sun rises
casting a golden shine of love
upon my brow
light shadows of my former self glisten through my fear
of what is near
they hand me crystal white goblets of silver wine
illuminating the shortness of time my silk robe
is wearing thin
pale
my heart is frail
twilight years loom
over the
hill
merging me still
halting my life
clearing away the white wash that distorts my vision
now the light glows in
i feel the beauty of this land
the fresh fragility of a rose
petals exposed
i no longer need to pose
casting a golden shine of love
upon my brow
light shadows of my former self glisten through my fear
of what is near
they hand me crystal white goblets of silver wine
illuminating the shortness of time my silk robe
is wearing thin
pale
my heart is frail
twilight years loom
over the
hill
merging me still
halting my life
clearing away the white wash that distorts my vision
now the light glows in
i feel the beauty of this land
the fresh fragility of a rose
petals exposed
i no longer need to pose
During the COVID19
During COVID I felt confused like I was in a haze it was looking at an awful live movie at first I had to to think outside to box come up with new ways to do everyday tasks I felt love in a more powerful way I had a lot more contact with family and friends ether online or in person
I had enough loo paper
I meet John Cleese
I did some artwork I went to the UK in my mid
I felt free I created my own YouTube channel I saw movies that I have always loved in order to feel safe eg
Star wars
The Muppet movie
Good will hunting
Kramer vs Kramer
The dark crystal
The hide always
Proof
All saints
I had enough loo paper
I meet John Cleese
I did some artwork I went to the UK in my mid
I felt free I created my own YouTube channel I saw movies that I have always loved in order to feel safe eg
Star wars
The Muppet movie
Good will hunting
Kramer vs Kramer
The dark crystal
The hide always
Proof
All saints
A reflection on my educational background – where it has helped me, and where it hasn't
In recent times I have been reflecting on my educational background, and possible gaps.
I completed my VCE, but to this day, I don't know how much it prepared me for adult life.
For example in VCE English year 12, my “Presentation of an Issue” CAT (Common Assessment Task) topic was “Should Australia send troops to Iraq?”, this was back in 1998 when Clinton was in power. Some how I got a B+ for that CAT, however there were several problems with it. 1. Most of the work had to be completed at home, which meant my parents had a lot of influence on the points I put forward. As I didn't often read the newspaper, watch the news, or do my own independent research. 2. When correcting my work, my teacher did not explain why she altered sentences, instead she just physically modified them. On one hand I understand she was changing the sentences to improve the grammar and fluidity of the syntax, therefore she felt she was enhancing the quality of the work, but in the process of doing so, she was not teaching me the correct word placement. I believe CATs no longer exist, and have been replaced by SATs (School Assessment Tasks).
Another concern I had was that a lot of work was written or typed by the integration aids. As such my spelling was impaired, and still is to a degree today.
I also studied Info Tech and covered a lot of theory about the role of Information Technology in Society, rather than learning about the practicalities of how computers actually operate, which I learned later in a computer course in 1999 through Yoralla Firstbase.
Much of the creative work I did for my writing folio was my own, but again the teacher didn't always encourage me to clarify the use of abstract imagery. And as a consequence is possibly why I sometimes I have trouble producing publishable pieces for an audience today.
I did seem to have a flair for poetic language, but some of the words I choose didn't always fit into a cohesively whole. I remember writing a poem about World War II, that I self published in year 10 for an anthology with the help of my English teacher. The opening lines were “They call you an ebony model, they call me a loose minded youth”. Whilst this shows clever personification skills for my age at the time, the concept seems a bit too abstract for the average reader to understand. Other examples include another opening line of the poem “Evil Young Guns” (nothing to do with Bon Jovi) “A broken grey tone traces the blank wit of the bar”. This creates quite a potent atmosphere for the reader, but at the same time from a grammatical and literal perspective doesn't makes sense. You could say this takes poetic licence a bit too far. Which relates to the idea of poetry, not only sounding clever, but also about fitting words together so the writer can demonstrate their own understanding of what they are writing about, the imagery, and the world they are trying to convey.
It wasn't until I attended a creative writing class in 2016, that I actually began to grasp this concept. I also wrote a line in the same poetry book, about the Vietnam war, “Do we know that we are banging our brothers in their own meat”, looking back now I can say yes. Ok, I can see that line has something to do with mateship and sacrificing our lives for the sake of others, but as a combination of words it doesn't actually make sense.
In addition I wrote a poem which begins “Drink my friends, roll the joints, taste the fags, hear the dead hearts”, these were lines out of a piece about a sexual assault. It was written so I could feel like I was part of the in-crowd. The truth was, I've never actually have smoked a cigarette, or rolled a joint in my life. It is often said in order to write with authenticity, you have to write from personal experience.
Some have always maintained, that my best work was composed back then, I tend to disagree. I think what I write at present has more structure and seems more coherent. It may be less creative and still have a long way to go, but I believe I am refining my skills.
Looking at the study material I covered in VCE, “The Agermemnon”, “The Great Gatsby”, “The Handmaids Tale”, “The English Patient”, “Fishing in the Stix”, and in addition the history of the Chinese Regime and the Russian revolution, I could probably give you an extremely fundamental summation of what these topics were about, however I would score very poorly if I had to write about them again in an exam sitting.
In conclusion whilst doing VCE gave me a comprehensive mainstream education, which I consider beneficial, I can also acknowledge certain aspects of my literacy and comprehension ability appeared to have been overlooked. And I can see that my reading levels were never formally assessed nor was my understanding of grammatical rules. So I’ve had to teach myself a lot of these skills since. I believe the biggest danger of having access to a integration aid, in a mainstream classroom, is the student unintentionally being dependant on them. Thus it's a good thing I never went to university and attended TAFE instead. I don't think I would have been able to cope with the expectations.
I completed my VCE, but to this day, I don't know how much it prepared me for adult life.
For example in VCE English year 12, my “Presentation of an Issue” CAT (Common Assessment Task) topic was “Should Australia send troops to Iraq?”, this was back in 1998 when Clinton was in power. Some how I got a B+ for that CAT, however there were several problems with it. 1. Most of the work had to be completed at home, which meant my parents had a lot of influence on the points I put forward. As I didn't often read the newspaper, watch the news, or do my own independent research. 2. When correcting my work, my teacher did not explain why she altered sentences, instead she just physically modified them. On one hand I understand she was changing the sentences to improve the grammar and fluidity of the syntax, therefore she felt she was enhancing the quality of the work, but in the process of doing so, she was not teaching me the correct word placement. I believe CATs no longer exist, and have been replaced by SATs (School Assessment Tasks).
Another concern I had was that a lot of work was written or typed by the integration aids. As such my spelling was impaired, and still is to a degree today.
I also studied Info Tech and covered a lot of theory about the role of Information Technology in Society, rather than learning about the practicalities of how computers actually operate, which I learned later in a computer course in 1999 through Yoralla Firstbase.
Much of the creative work I did for my writing folio was my own, but again the teacher didn't always encourage me to clarify the use of abstract imagery. And as a consequence is possibly why I sometimes I have trouble producing publishable pieces for an audience today.
I did seem to have a flair for poetic language, but some of the words I choose didn't always fit into a cohesively whole. I remember writing a poem about World War II, that I self published in year 10 for an anthology with the help of my English teacher. The opening lines were “They call you an ebony model, they call me a loose minded youth”. Whilst this shows clever personification skills for my age at the time, the concept seems a bit too abstract for the average reader to understand. Other examples include another opening line of the poem “Evil Young Guns” (nothing to do with Bon Jovi) “A broken grey tone traces the blank wit of the bar”. This creates quite a potent atmosphere for the reader, but at the same time from a grammatical and literal perspective doesn't makes sense. You could say this takes poetic licence a bit too far. Which relates to the idea of poetry, not only sounding clever, but also about fitting words together so the writer can demonstrate their own understanding of what they are writing about, the imagery, and the world they are trying to convey.
It wasn't until I attended a creative writing class in 2016, that I actually began to grasp this concept. I also wrote a line in the same poetry book, about the Vietnam war, “Do we know that we are banging our brothers in their own meat”, looking back now I can say yes. Ok, I can see that line has something to do with mateship and sacrificing our lives for the sake of others, but as a combination of words it doesn't actually make sense.
In addition I wrote a poem which begins “Drink my friends, roll the joints, taste the fags, hear the dead hearts”, these were lines out of a piece about a sexual assault. It was written so I could feel like I was part of the in-crowd. The truth was, I've never actually have smoked a cigarette, or rolled a joint in my life. It is often said in order to write with authenticity, you have to write from personal experience.
Some have always maintained, that my best work was composed back then, I tend to disagree. I think what I write at present has more structure and seems more coherent. It may be less creative and still have a long way to go, but I believe I am refining my skills.
Looking at the study material I covered in VCE, “The Agermemnon”, “The Great Gatsby”, “The Handmaids Tale”, “The English Patient”, “Fishing in the Stix”, and in addition the history of the Chinese Regime and the Russian revolution, I could probably give you an extremely fundamental summation of what these topics were about, however I would score very poorly if I had to write about them again in an exam sitting.
In conclusion whilst doing VCE gave me a comprehensive mainstream education, which I consider beneficial, I can also acknowledge certain aspects of my literacy and comprehension ability appeared to have been overlooked. And I can see that my reading levels were never formally assessed nor was my understanding of grammatical rules. So I’ve had to teach myself a lot of these skills since. I believe the biggest danger of having access to a integration aid, in a mainstream classroom, is the student unintentionally being dependant on them. Thus it's a good thing I never went to university and attended TAFE instead. I don't think I would have been able to cope with the expectations.