Poem of the Day - Part 55

 Georgie Porgie

Today's poem is a lighthearted version of the old nursery rhyme "Georgie Porgie."  I slightly modified the words.

                                                Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie

                                                Kissed the boys and made them sigh.

                                                When the girls came out to play,

                                                Georgie Porgie ran away.

Photographers - Part 56

 Indigenous Australians

Yesterday we saw some cave paintings and other art by Australian Aboriginal people.  If you got the impression from the art that Aboriginal men didn't wear much clothing, you are correct, and that continued into modern times, as documented in today's photos.

Not all Aboriginal people were naked.  Remember, Australia is an entire continent.  At the time that Europeans arrived, there were over 250 different Aboriginal groups, each speaking a different language and with different customs.  Nevertheless, nudity was common and was not considered shocking or shameful.

Above, an Aboriginal man named Cunninghun from the Armidale district in New South Wales, photographed in the 1890s by Charles H. Kerry.

By the way, the term "aborigine" is now considered culturally insensitive, because it has racist connotations from Australia's past, but to call a person "Aboriginal" or an "Indigenous Australian" is OK.

This 1900 photo by Handley & Atkinson Photographers shows an Aboriginal family standing in front of a bark shelter in Queensland.

Two Worrorra men with impressive full body scarification at the Kunmunya Mission in Western Australia, photographed in 1924 by Auber Octavius Neville.  Unfortunately, the photo has been censored.

Neville, the "Chief Protector Of Aborigines," is infamous for his policy of removing Indigenous Australian children from their families to be raised in white culture. 

The scars are not from fighting or other wounds.  Scarification was done as a ritual for certain events such as puberty, marriage, birth of a child, or death of relatives.

Here's an Aboriginal man with a spear thrower and spear in the Warburton Range in Western Australia, photographed by Michael Terry in 1931.

The spear thrower or woomera is not part of the spear.  It is a wooden device that hooks onto the back end of the spear and acts like an extension of the arm, enabling the spear to be thrown with much greater speed and force.

An Aboriginal man at Yingurrdu Soak in the Northern Territory, photographed by Michael Terry in 1932.

The director at Yingurrdu in the Northern Territory having a conversation with Aboriginal men and boys, photographed by Michael Terry in 1932.

A fourth photo by Michael Terry shows an Aboriginal man with body scarring holding spears in Western Australia in 1932.

An Aboriginal man in a bark canoe spearing fish in North Queensland, photographed by A.H.E. Mattingley in 1934.

A North Queensland Aboriginal man spearing fish, photographed by A.H.E. Mattingley in 1934.

An Aboriginal man throws a boomerang in the Devil's Marbles area in the Northern Territory north of Alice Springs, photographed by Roy Dunstan in 1936-1938.

Note that the man is circumcised.  Circumcision was practiced by many Indigenous Australian groups long before Europeans arrived in Australia.  It was not done as infant circumcision, but as a puberty rite performed on boys at about age 12.

We end with a 1940 photo by Charles P. Mountford of an Aboriginal hunter carrying spears, a woomera, and the kangaroo that he hunted.  Hunting and fishing naked was apparently still common practice for Aboriginal men in the 1930s and 1940s.

Artists - Part 59

 Australian Aboriginal Art

People first migrated to Australia 65,000 years ago.  Above is a cave painting in Arnhem Land in Northern Australia that has been radiocarbon dated as 28,000 years old.  To give you some context, the Stone Age cave paintings in Lascaux, France are 17,000 years old, and civilization in Mesopotamia and Egypt arose around 5000 years ago (the Pyramids of Egypt are about 4500 years old).  So this art is old!

And what does this ancient art depict?  Two people fucking.  Some subjects of interest haven't changed in 28,000 years.

This cave art, also in Arnhem Land, is between 6,000 and 10,000 years old.  It depicts two figures easily identified as men by their penises.

Another rock painting features a very prominent erect penis.

This rock art figure in Kakadu National Park, Northern Australia, is painted in what has been called the X-ray style, showing bones and ribs in addition to external features like his penis.  It is said to represent Nabulwinjbulwinj, a spirit who eats females after killing them by striking them with a yam.

The rock art around Sydney in southeastern Australia is quite different.  These are carved figures, not painted, of a man and a woman, dating back 5,000 to 7,000 years.

More rock art from Terrey Hills in northern Sydney shows a kangaroo and a figure who is either a well-endowed man or perhaps the creator god Baiame.   

We end with much more recent rock art, a painting showing another figure with a prominent penis, plus a white man on a horse at left, and another horse at right.  It must have been made after Europeans and horses came to Australia in the 1700s.

Beach Bums Part 53

San Gregorio Beach 

San Gregorio Beach, also known as San Gregorio Private Beach, is a bit south of San Francisco and just north of San Gregorio State Beach.  A fee is charged for parking.  The private beach has been a nude beach since 1966.  It is used primary by gay men.

The beach is enormous – two miles of soft sand and tide pools.  Even on the most crowded days there may be only a few people around you.

Few people go swimming, because the Pacific Ocean in Northern California is pretty cold

There's lots of driftwood on the beach.  It has been piled into enclosures two to three feet high at the back of the beach called "condos."

The condos are popular.  Use of them is first-come, first-served.  Above, a guy in a condo ...

enjoying himself.

These condos seem to be treated as private spaces ...

even though they're in full view of the beach.

So, who's "up" for going to San Gregorio beach?

Not the Same Old Song - Part 49

Shoot Your Shot

Shoot Your Shot is a 1982 song by Divine.  Commentators said that the song is about confidence, seizing opportunities, and pursuing your dreams, with "shoot your shot" meaning "give it your best shot."  However, since Divine was a gay man, and he performed as a drag queen, often telling the audience "fuck you very much," I'm thinking that my interpretation of "shoot your shot" might be closer to what Divine had in mind.

As long-time followers of my blog know, I never post porn.  Or, to quote the song from Gilbert & Sullivan's HMS Pinafore:

What, never?

No, never!

What, never?

Well, hardly ever!

Calendars - Part 55

 Maltby Miners Memorial

The Maltby Mine was a coal mine in South Yorkshire, England.  It started in 1910 and continued in operation until 2013, when it was closed due to dangerous geological conditions (oil, water and gas seeping into the mine).

Over the years, 167 men died in the mine, 27 of them in a gas explosion on a single day in 1927.  In 2014, the remaining miners wanted to construct a memorial to those who died.  They raised money for the memorial in the time-honored English way: they posed for and sold a naked calendar that came out in 2015.

January.  Like all of these English nude calendars, frontal views are concealed, but one of these guys didn't quite hide everything.

February.  These are clearly real miners, not models.

Mr. March.

Mr. June, strumming a banjo.

Mr. July.

Mr August in the showers.

Mr.  September in the locker room.

Mr.  October.

Mr. November.

December, (un)dressed for the holidays.

We end with a miner's end, possibly the back cover.

Gods, Myths and Heroes - Part 50

 Eros

When you think of Cupid, is this what you picture – a little boy with wings shooting the arrows of love?

Cupid was the Roman name for the Greek god Eros.  Yes, he had wings and a bow and arrows, but he was originally far from being a little boy.  He was a gorgeous hunky young man, and he was the god of love and sex.  He was also known by the name Amor (love).

(Above: Clement Daguin as the god Eros in the 2019 Dieux du Stade calendar.)

The most famous myth about Eros/Cupid is the story of Cupid and Psyche.  Psyche was a girl so beautiful that people said she was more beautiful than Venus, the goddess of love.  Venus, displeased, tells her son Cupid to make Psyche fall in love with someone low and ugly.  Instead, Cupid accidentally scratches himself with his own arrow and falls in love with Psyche.  Psyche is taken to a remote place where, every night in the dark, Cupid makes love to her, but she doesn't know who he is, and he tells her she must never see him in the light.

(Above: Cupid and Psyche by François-Édouard Picot, c. 1817)

Of course, Psyche wants to see who her lover is.  One night, after Cupid falls asleep, Psyche lights an oil lamp.  She sees the gorgeous winged god, but accidentally spills a drop of hot oil on Cupid.  He wakes up and flies away, and he doesn't come back.

(Above: Amor and Psyche by Jacopo_Zucchi, 1589.)

In a quandary, Psyche goes to the goddess Venus for help – not a good idea, because Venus is the one who hated Psyche in the first place.  Venus says Psyche must perform three difficult tasks.  The first task is to sort a huge mass of mixed seeds in a single night.  The ants take pity on Psyche and sort the seeds for her.

The second task is to cross a river and fetch the golden wool of the sheep of Helios.

The painting above of the second task by Guilio Romano, c. 1526, shows the river god in the foreground.  What caught my eye is that the source of the river is (1) the river god's beard, which turns into water,(2) the jar that he's holding, and (3) something white that's flowing out of his penis.

Psyche's third task is to go down to the underworld and bring back a box containing the beauty of Persephone, the goddess of the underworld, but not to open the box.  On the way back, Psyche opens the box, and it contains not beauty but magic that plunges Psyche into endless sleep.

Cupid finds Psyche asleep and awakens her with a kiss (above), which breaks the spell.

(Above, Eros and Psyche by Antonio Canova, 1793, in the Louvre).

Above is a copy of the Canova sculpture in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.  Some of the the details have been changed.  In particular, Cupid's balls are much bigger in this version.   

Psyche is then brought to Mt. Olympus, where the gods live.  Jupiter/Zeus, the king of the gods, makes Psyche into a goddess, and Cupid and Psyche live happily ever after.

(Above: Mercury brings Psyche to Olympus by Raphael, 1518)

However, there are other stories about Eros/Cupid, and Eros was the god of homosexual love as well as heterosexual love.  Above is the statue Cupid Kindling the Torch of Hymen by George Rennie, 1831.  Hymen was the god of marriage, but this statue of two naked gods cuddling has a gay vibe.  

Artist Felix d'Eon used Cupid to promote same-sex love in the photo above from a party when he opened his gallery.

As the god of love, Eros has certainly been used for commercial products.  Above, an ad for Eros perfume for men by Planet Yum.

Here's a clip from a commercial for Eros fragrance by Versace, with a distinct gay appeal.

We end with a clip promoting a San Francisco bathhouse called Eros.  Why is this video appropriate, besides the name of the bathhouse?  Because Eros was not just the god of romantic love, he was the god of physical love: sex.  The word erotic comes from the god Eros.