Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts

Saturday, January 13, 2024

Old movie

 


“That’s an old movie – you can tell by the cell phones they’re using.”

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
This was said by a relatively young person (born in 1986). Makes me feel downright ancient because old movies to me are still those that were made in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. They definitely used rotary phones in those days – if any.

Thursday, October 15, 2015

About A. H.

What a nasty, greasy character to have ignited this hellish chapter in the history of mankind.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2015)

Written around the words greasy, hellish and ignite from 3WW.

Note
No need to explain who this refers to. At least I should hope so.

Friday, March 6, 2015

The if I could haiku

If I could, I would
turn the I.S. destroyers
of Nimrod to stone.


– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2015)

The Islamic State has been destroying more than 3000 year old Assyrian monuments in Iraq. The intolerance and bigoted narrow-mindedness of these self-righteous, self-appointed guardians of inhuman faith is unsurpassed.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Laced with …

Octavius grasped the pacifier with dread.
Having to die in this manner after one insignificant battle lost seemed like a child’s cruel joke.
But then again, Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, better known as Caligula, often acted like a child and loved cruel jokes.

– Leonard "Historicus" Blumfeld

Written for 3WW using dread, grasp, pacify.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

One night in Addis Abeba

For her

Had we listened
to the voice within us,
we would have pursued
careers in diplomacy.

I would have studied
African languages,
as once intended,
majoring in Ethiopian.

You would have gone
to Moscow, as your father
had planned for you,
to ultimately join the corps.

We would have met
at a party hosted by the
Kenian embassy, both
unattached, and shared

a taxi when leaving.
We had the driver
take us to Sebastian’s,
where we had cocktails,

looked into each
other’s eyes, eventually
kissing across the chasm
between the communist

and capitalist worlds,
allowing the voice witin us
to speak and outline brightly
our future.

That did not happen, though.
All we have now is
an obscured variant, with the
feeling of potential lost

and but a skeleton of what
the scheme of fate and time
might have had in store.
We both muted that voice.

– Leonard “Had We But” Blumfeld (© 2010)

Written for The thing you didn’t choose, napowrimo #11 and Vicarious at One Single Impression.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Dinner for eight

Guests invited*

1. Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (1194-1250), to ask him what the mysterious Castel del Monte was all about, question him about his irreverent religious beliefs and many other things.
2. Saint Francis of Assisi, who lived at about the same time (1181-1226). I assume he did not appreciate Frederick very much (and vice-versa perhaps), but it might be fun having these two facing each other at the table.
3. Plato (428 BC-347 BC), to ask him what he really knew about Atlantis.
4. Sylvia Plath (1932-1963), just to have her back for a while.
5. Frank O’Hara (1926-1966). He, Sylvia, Plato and I could talk poetry, for example. I would imagine Frank to be the cheerful soul of the evening.
6. Kamala Das (1934-2009), to have somebody outspoken from another continent.
7. Léo Ferré (1916-1993), another one unlikely to bite his tongue.
8. I myself, meek and mild, trying to balance the mixture of egos big and small around the dinner table.

I might do the cooking myself – a 5-course south Indian meal, for example, to have these older folks taste something different. I’d serve the best of drinks – Italian table water, red and white wines from Germany, Italy and France, and Calva as a digestif. Should make for an interesting and amusing evening.

– Len “He Loves His Food” Blumfeld

* upon instigation by Sunday Scribblings (task description: Do you ever play the game where you decide who you would invite to your fantasy dinner party?

The rules are:
- you can invite anyone, living or dead
- you have a table that seats eight, but as you are one, you can invite seven people
- you have to explain why you'd invite them

And for bonus points:
- what would you serve them for dinner?)

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Cross act


The crossbow acted
as intended
and split the apple
on Walter’s head

– Leonard Blumfeld

A somewhat martial take on the two words proposed by Two for Tuesdaycross and act. Also inspired by Friedrich Schiller's play about William Tell.

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

History of the sigh pt. 2: precursors

I know that all (0) of you have been dieing for the 2nd part of the history of the sigh. I know. Sorry.

To continue, here's another pastoral elegy. It was written by Moschus (Greek poet, middle of 2nd century BC) and bemoans the death of the third idyllic Greek poet, Bion (the first one is Theocritus, the second Moschus himself).

Now why would anybody have poisoned an innocent heardsman like Bion? This question will probably never be answered unless somebody manages to take a close look at the Akasha chronicles.

For those of you who prefer a fast read, I recommend reading only the refrain (Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.). The fastest-paced part of the body is where it says [Here seven verses are lost.].

IDYL III - THE LAMENT FOR BION

Wail, let me hear you wail, ye woodland glades, and thou Dorian water; and weep ye rivers, for Bion, the well beloved! Now all ye green things mourn, and now ye groves lament him, ye flowers now in sad clusters breathe yourselves away. Now redden ye roses in your sorrow, and now wax red ye wind-flowers, now thou hyacinth, whisper the letters on thee graven, and add a deeper ai ai to thy petals; he is dead, the beautiful singer.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Ye nightingales that lament among the thick leaves of the trees, tell ye to the Sicilian waters of Arethusa the tidings that Bion the herdsman is dead, and that with Bion song too has died, and perished hath the Dorian minstrelsy.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Ye Strymonian swans, sadly wail ye by the waters, and chant with melancholy notes the dolorous song, even such a song as in his time with voice like yours he was wont to sing. And tell again to the Œagrian maidens, tell to all the Nymphs Bistonian, how that he hath perished, the Dorian Orpheus.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
No more to his herds he sings, that beloved herdsman, no more ‘neath the lonely oaks he sits and sings, nay, but by Pluteus’s side he chants a refrain of oblivion. The mountains too are voiceless: and the heifers that wander by the bulls lament and refuse their pasture.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Thy sudden doom, O Bion, Apollo himself lamented, and the Satyrs mourned thee, and the Priapi in sable raiment, and the Panes sorrow for thy song, and the fountain fairies in the wood made moan, and their tears turned to rivers of waters. And Echo in the rocks laments that thou art silent, and no more she mimics thy voice. And in sorrow for thy fall the trees cast down their fruit, and all the flowers have faded. From the ewes hath flowed no fair milk, nor honey from the hives, nay, it hath perished for mere sorrow in the wax, for now hath thy honey perished, and no more it behoves men to gather the honey of the bees.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Not so much did the dolphin mourn beside the sea-banks, nor ever sang so sweet the nightingale on the cliffs, nor so much lamented the swallow on the long ranges of the hills, nor shrilled so loud the halcyon o’er his sorrows;

(Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.)

Nor so much, by the grey sea-waves, did ever the sea-bird sing, nor so much in the dells of dawn did the bird of Memnon bewail the son of the Morning, fluttering around his tomb, as they lamented for Bion dead.

Nightingales, and all the swallows that once he was wont to delight, that he would teach to speak, they sat over against each other on the boughs and kept moaning, and the birds sang in answer, ‘Wail, ye wretched ones, even ye!’

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Who, ah who will ever make music on thy pipe, O thrice desired Bion, and who will put his mouth to the reeds of thine instrument? who is so bold?

For still thy lips and still thy breath survive, and Echo, among the reeds, doth still feed upon thy songs. To Pan shall I bear the pipe? Nay, perchance even he would fear to set his mouth to it, lest, after thee, he should win but the second prize.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Yea, and Galatea laments thy song, she whom once thou wouldst delight, as with thee she sat by the sea-banks. For not like the Cyclops didst thou sing - him fair Galatea ever fled, but on thee she still looked more kindly than on the salt water. And now hath she forgotten the wave, and sits on the lonely sands, but still she keeps thy kine.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
All the gifts of the Muses, herdsman, have died with thee, the delightful kisses of maidens, the lips of boys; and woful round thy tomb the loves are weeping. But Cypris loves thee far more than the kiss wherewith she kissed the dying Adonis.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
This, O most musical of rivers, is thy second sorrow, this, Meles, thy new woe. Of old didst thou lose Homer, that sweet mouth of Calliope, and men say thou didst bewail thy goodly son with streams of many tears, and didst fill all the salt sea with the voice of thy lamentation - now again another son thou weepest, and in a new sorrow art thou wasting away.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Both were beloved of the fountains, and one ever drank of the Pegasean fount, but the other would drain a draught of Arethusa. And the one sang the fair daughter of Tyndarus, and the mighty son of Thetis, and Menelaus Atreus’s son, but that other, - not of wars, not of tears, but of Pan, would he sing, and of herdsmen would he chant, and so singing, he tended the herds. And pipes he would fashion, and would milk the sweet heifer, and taught lads how to kiss, and Love he cherished in his bosom and woke the passion of Aphrodite.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Every famous city laments thee, Bion, and all the towns. Ascra laments thee far more than her Hesiod, and Pindar is less regretted by the forests of Boeotia. Nor so much did pleasant Lesbos mourn for Alcaeus, nor did the Teian town so greatly bewail her poet, while for thee more than for Archilochus doth Paros yearn, and not for Sappho, but still for thee doth Mytilene wail her musical lament;

[Here seven verses are lost.]
And in Syracuse Theocritus; but I sing thee the dirge of an Ausonian sorrow, I that am no stranger to the pastoral song, but heir of the Doric Muse which thou didst teach thy pupils. This was thy gift to me; to others didst thou leave thy wealth, to me thy minstrelsy.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Ah me, when the mallows wither in the garden, and the green parsley, and the curled tendrils of the anise, on a later day they live again, and spring in another year; but we men, we, the great and mighty, or wise, when once we have died, in hollow earth we sleep, gone down into silence; a right long, and endless, and unawakening sleep. And thou too, in the earth wilt be lapped in silence, but the nymphs have thought good that the frog should eternally sing. Nay, him I would not envy, for ‘tis no sweet song he singeth.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
Poison came, Bion, to thy mouth, thou didst know poison. To such lips as thine did it come, and was not sweetened? What mortal was so cruel that could mix poison for thee, or who could give thee the venom that heard thy voice? surely he had no music in his soul.

Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the dirge.
But justice hath overtaken them all. Still for this sorrow I weep, and bewail thy ruin. But ah, if I might have gone down like Orpheus to Tartarus, or as once Odysseus, or Alcides of yore, I too would speedily have come to the house of Pluteus, that thee perchance I might behold, and if thou singest to Pluteus, that I might hear what is thy song. Nay, sing to the Maiden some strain of Sicily, sing some sweet pastoral lay.

And she too is Sicilian, and on the shores by Aetna she was wont to play, and she knew the Dorian strain. Not unrewarded will the singing be; and as once to Orpheus’s sweet minstrelsy she gave Eurydice to return with him, even so will she send thee too, Bion, to the hills. But if I, even I, and my piping had aught availed, before Pluteus I too would have sung.

(Translator: Andrew Lang)

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

History of the sigh pt. 1: precursors

Famous example of a pastoral elegy –

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard (1751)

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

The applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscribed alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined;
Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.

Thomas Gray (1716-1771)