Wednesday, June 27, 2007

The drat fib

Drat,
drool,
this is
not cool. Will
another dawn break
tomorrow? You betcha it will.

– Leon B.

Note:
An accurate end-of-day statement.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

The I feel bad in unison fib

I
feel
bad. She's
turning her
eyes away and slinks
by. My mood slumps and time slinks by.

– Lenny B., from the office front

Friday, June 15, 2007

Love of the common people

I was going to write a fib on the theme of little sister crying (because my wife's little sister cried for hours after losing a computer password), when the memory of this song popped up in my mind. I'd first heard it sung by Nicky Thomas (a reggae number that came out in 1970), then had it on a record in the version performed by Waylon Jennings, which is much weaker. Anyway, it's a great song about little sister's tears, and I scrapped the idea of writing a fib about it.

Love of the common people
Livin' on free food tickets
Water in the milk from the hole in the roof
Where the rain came through
What can you do?

Tears from little sister cryin'
'Cause she doesn't have a dress without a patch
For the party to go
Oh, but you know she'll get by.

She is livin' in the love of the common people
Smiles from the heart of the family man
Daddy's gonna buy her a dream to cling to
Mama's gonna love her just as much as she can, she can.

It's a good thing you don't have the bus fare
It would fall through the hole in your pocket
And you'd lose it in the snow on the ground
A walking to town to find a job.

Trying to keep your hands warm
But the hole in your shoe let the snow come through
And it chills to the bone, boy
You'd better go home where it's warm.

Where you can live in the love of the common people
Smiles from the heart of the family man
Daddy's gonna buy her a dream to cling to
Mama's gonna love her just as much as she can, she can.

Livin' on dreams ain't easy
But the closer the knit the tighter the fit
And the chills stay away
You take 'em in stride family pride.

You know that faith is your foundation
And with a whole lotta love and a warm conversation
And plenty of prayer
Making you strong where you belong.

Where you can live in the love of the common people
Smiles from the heart of the family man
Daddy's gonna buy her a dream to cling to
Mama's gonna love her just as much as she can, she can...

(Written by Ronnie Wilkins and John Hurley)

Here's the song performed by Nicky Thomas on Youtube – good sound quality, but only a static picture:

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

From the office work province

  1. The blinds are down, there's a welcomingly mild sun out there. Most people have gone out for lunch. It's peaceful here in the outpost of a gigantic company.
  2. I suffer from time elapse anxiety syndrome (TEA).
  3. Do many people suffer from this disease?
  4. Symptom: feeling that time is slipping by without you getting urgent things done.
  5. This symptom makes me nervous.
  6. Until I succumb to the next "what's so important that it really needs to be done in the overall scheme of things" mood.
  7. Those moods are philosophical and soothing,
  8. but they don't get anything done.

Yours from the office grind Len B.

Monday, June 4, 2007

Inspired by a chanteuse

A
nerv-
ous lithe
slip of a
singer – small titter
monkey, cheeks clenched, on swaying branch.

– Len B.

Friday, June 1, 2007

A painting

To-
day’s
will be
three-colored:
grey, ox blood, sleet. It
will feature rain, people cooped up
inside, the mood of
endurance,
no
spark.

– Len Sparkles B. (© 2007)

Sunday, May 27, 2007

More green, more pastoral

All in green my love went riding

All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the merry deer ran before.

Fleeter be they than dappled dreams
the swift sweet deer
the red rare deer.

Horn at hip went my love riding
riding the echo down
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the level meadows ran before.

Softer be they than slippered sleep
the lean lithe deer
the fleet flown deer.

Four fleet does at a gold valley
the famished arrows sang before.

Bow at belt went my love riding
riding the mountain down into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the sheer peaks ran before.

Paler be they than daunting death
the sleek slim deer
the tall tense deer.

Four tall stags at a green mountain
the lucky hunter sang before.

All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
my heart fell dead before.

e. e. cummings

From Tulips and Chimneys, 1923

Cf. Still life with tulip and chimneys written by my alter ego.

Pastoral fib

Moo
waits.
She does
not stray, not
one bit. One sylla-
ble words do it simply better.
Oh but she has strayed.
By one blade,
one shade
of
green.

– Len Blumfeld (© 2007)

Not only elegies can be pastoral. The blues can be ("Milk Cow Blues"!), and so can fibs.

Afterthought
Had this in green originally to go with the pastoral theme and the blade/shade of green. Changed it to Allgäu cow color because green on black is a harsh contrast that did not match the meekness of the intended cow.

An immodest proposition

Shouldn't you, like, show some involvement in the real world? Like occasionally at least?
This could have been said by my friend Karraine, a confirmed Californian, even though it's me saying it now while muzing – once again – about the purpose of writing in general or my writing in particular. You see, I'm one of those occasionally self-destructive, morbid, tormented souls* who go back to point zero at times to question the very ground they stand on, aka the validity of it all.
Like, shouldn't we all be working and earning something instead of doing useless stuff like writing?

What do you mean by writing anyway? Are you like some published guy? Like Dan Brown?
– Len B.
... in a somewhat grey Sunday morning mood on an overcast Sunday.

*This again could have been a quote from Karraine.

Rebuttal
But I did situate myself in some reality recently, by watching last night's soccer match between VfB Stuttgart and 1. FC Nuremberg. To see (Jeronimo Baretto) Cacau cry on the bench about his team losing, perhaps as a consequence of his red card removal from the match.

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Blogger & Firefox

Blogger and the Fire Fox
Play ring around the rosies.
What a bunch of posies!

Put together Mother Goose, Blogspot and Firefox, and you get this ... or an endless cycle of log-on attempts. It's very much like watching the window of a front-loading washing machine. So, sorry to say, I've been forced to use MS IE Explorer to log onto this blog for several weeks.

Anybody out there who knows why this is happening and how it can be stopped???