Standing on a rooftop in Parktown
\nLooking at the Jozi skyline and the vodacom sign on Ponti Towers
\nWhere the greenery of the north gets traded
\nfor the grey, ugly and scentless concrete flowers.<\/p>\n
You find yourself feeling the loneliness of the people in the streets below
\nEach alone. Each empty. Solitary in a crowd of other strangers
\nAnd in your head Valiant Swart is playing a sad lovesong to the evening sky
\nAnd you realize, ours alone is to answer why. Everyone still strangers.<\/p>\n
And you shake your head at the sightless eyes
\nand spin on your heel and stomp back to reality, a milion things to do.
\nAnd you put on your headphones and drown your sentimentality
\nin Karen Zoid stew.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A poem<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[20,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aj-venter","category-uncategorical"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9blZT-dl","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1367,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2006\/11\/16\/ron-mueck-at-the-brooklyn-museum\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":0},"title":"Ron Mueck at the Brooklyn Museum","author":"sean slemon","date":"16 November 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"This weekend, Ed Young and Christian Nerf were in town - to cause trouble. So we took a break from that and went to the Brooklyn Museum, where Ron Mueck currently has a mid-career solo on show. If you don't know his work, he pretty much makes small, or large\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":324,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2004\/04\/19\/eat-etc\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":1},"title":"eat, etc","author":"nathaniel","date":"19 April 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"What a week! I like to think that my opening at outlet last Wednesday was pretty successful - there was a very nice Joburg\/Pretoria mixed crowd, and so far, there seems to be interest from 3 parties in purchasing the limited edition DVD (out of 5). I'd appreciate any feedback\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "me"","block_context":{"text":"me","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/me\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2922,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/28\/jessica-meuninck-ganger-gallery-aop-johannesburg\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":2},"title":"Jessica Meuninck-Ganger @ Gallery AOP, Johannesburg","author":"nathaniel","date":"28 June 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"GALLERY AOP www.galleryaop.com Jessica Meuninck-Ganger Position \/ Opposition (detail)\u00c2\u00a0 2011 Artist book installation: drypoint, letterpress, etching & aquatint, lithography and drawing on Thai mulberry paper & muslin\u00c2\u00a0 2,3m high X 1,2m X 10m (open) Jessica Meuninck-Ganger Position \/ Opposition 2 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c 23 July 2011 Opening Saturday 2 July at 14:00\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.galleryaop.co.za\/bulk_messaging\/2011_06_meunicnk_01.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.galleryaop.co.za\/bulk_messaging\/2011_06_meunicnk_01.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.galleryaop.co.za\/bulk_messaging\/2011_06_meunicnk_01.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":948,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2005\/11\/30\/kaganof-janssen\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":3},"title":"kaganof & janssen","author":"kaganof","date":"30 November 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"photo by karen bradtke who runs the wonderful artspace gallery in durban contact her at artspace_durban@yahoo.com","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":610,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2005\/05\/26\/groups\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":4},"title":"Groups","author":"BradyDale","date":"26 May 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Nat's first guest blog... So this morning (afternoon for Nat), he asked me if I wanted to be one of his first guest bloggers on here. Is this his first? I read back a little ways until I found him asking for guest bloggers, so maybe I am the first\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "art"","block_context":{"text":"art","link":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":507,"url":"https:\/\/nathanielstern.com\/blog\/2004\/11\/22\/whatd-i-miss\/","url_meta":{"origin":827,"position":5},"title":"What’d I miss?","author":"nathaniel","date":"22 November 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Nicky and I went away this weekend, for a bit of alone time and relaxing. Over the next while, you'll be seeing reviews and rants about a few things I missed. 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