Poltava to Lviv, January 17, 1942

Field marshal, felled by
stroke while jogging at minus 
forty. Passed on plane.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
Refers to German field marshal Walter von Reichenau, responsible for the massacre at Babi Yar in 1941. Reichenau was an enthusiastic supporter of sports and went on cross-country runs regularly. Having died in 1942, Reichenau was never convicted of war crimes but most certainly would have had he survived WWII. This haiku was indirectly inspired by reading about Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poem Babiyy Yar (1961), which is about the massacre. 

A lesser known Neruda quote

And when I swanned myself again, I had become my own swimmer, my own beak.

Attributed to Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, translator and source unknown.

Notes
Came across this on a social network page today that, going by its other postings, is a jumble of things gleaned from here and there and anywhere. Of course, there was no mention of a source or context. Therefore it’s quite possible that someone made this up and attributed it to a famous poet to elevate its importance.

Another instructional haiku

Silence, when getting
too heavy, must be relieved.
How about a shriek?

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
Actually, I was going to write about my own silence getting too heavy, i.e. not writing was taking on monstrous proportions. The shriek therefore is this haiku. More of the unheard kind. Like one from the stone monster above.

Photo by Johannes Beilharz, taken at the Monster Park in Bomarzo, Italy.

The pupation of Donald Trump

 

This worm will always remain a worm.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020) 

Photo by Nick Windsor on Unsplash

The desperate letters haiku

 

Writing half-withered
letters to Sea, the under-
standing blue houseplant

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note:
Inspired by a haiku by N. Gutierrez, turned inside out and deformed in other ways.

Photo by Antonio Grosz on Unsplash

The James Schuyler haiku

 

He had Brahms and Bruno 
Walter – both long dead – engaged in
lively conversation.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
All true! See James Schuyler’s poem A Man in Blue from Freely Espousing (1969).

Bruno Walter, conductor and pianist (1876-1962)
Johannes Brahms, composer, pianist, conductor (1833-1897)

My life as a hunter and gatherer

was short-lived. I could 
not kill animals and found 
only acorns to eat.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
There are some, mostly male chauvinists, who proclaim that they were meant to be hunters (while women were meant to be gatherers, of course) and that the failure of many men in current society can be explained by the alienation that is due to them not being able to go after their hunting business. So I pictured this return to nature for myself for a second, did a mental reality check and quickly returned to contemporary amenities (for example, a computer to write and publish stuff).

The dark day haiku

Carry a flashlight
to walk the streets of Rome – it
is that dark today.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
The truth and nothing but. The seemingly endless scorchers of summer 2020 have come to a dark and wet end for the time being.

Dunking simplified

Put the cookie in
your mouth, sip coffee, wait
until soggy, down.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
There are people with dunking problems, e.g. if the cookie disintegrates when dunked in the coffee (or tea or milk or whatever). Follow the above haiku to avoid this. Try it!

PS: I was going to write “down the hatch” instead of “down”, but that would have violated haiku rules.

Leave A Note

Played around with one of Jennifer Dewalt's sites called Leave A Note.

These are notes I left:

No idea why I was thinking of the Beatles, but this sure was fun, like many other of her sites.

By the way: The correct reading sequence is to start from the bottom.

Monosyllabic again

Oh no! What now? So
we’re fucked? Can’t be all true, no
way, Ho Say! Right-ho.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
I seem to remember having written and posted a monosyllabic haiku (don’t remember it or what it might have been about – but I have a chronically bad memory for things I’ve written, so nothing new there). 
Well, here comes another one. It cheats a little bit, because José actually has two syllables. However, I don’t think this will upset anyone excessively. 
Anyway, the general bias goes well with this year, which might go down in history as a year that was effed up in many ways.

PS: Did research and found the other one.

The a bad part of creation haiku

Smells blood, lands on you, 

inserts stinger, injects

saliva, sucks your blood.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Notes

Mosquitos: one of the worst parts of creation ever invented. And no, Mr. Darwin, I don’t believe this could possibly have come about all by itself – too devious. Selection of the nastiest?

The Donald Trump haiku

The mover and shaker
has moved to another golf course
to shake a few clubs.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
Doing the only thing he might be half good at. Besides spreading lies and clapping for himself, of course. The haiku is slightly overfilled, like the man himself.

The amazing prowess of Goggle ... oops ... you know what

   

Goggle keeps amazing the world! 

   

Not only is it the world's best search engine (how bad must the others be!) according to Internet statistics that appear to be virtually unanimous, but it also offers Goggle docs, which allow you to do anything you could possibly want ... except buying food and eating it while you're working on your Goggle docs.

However, there's one thing it doesn't like ... and considers a potential "grammar" issue:

DO NOT USE GOGGLE INSTEAD OF GOOGLE

The Laura Nyro haiku

I like her looks more 
than her singing and songs. 
Strange as it may seem.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
The plain truth. Someone on tumblr recently posted a song by Laura Nyro, which reminded me of the one album of hers – New York Tendaberry – I have. As a consequence, I spent about half an hour listening to Nyro on youtube, coming to the conclusion that my love for her music and style of singing has not grown during about a decade of not listening. 

The Windows update haiku

Walking around like
a tiger in a cage – Micro-
soft is updating.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Notes
The truth and nothing but. Well, except that I didn’t really turn into a tiger. But my anger is that of a caged big cat. It’s been going on for years – you are trying to get some work done while Microsoft nixes all your plans by doing an excruciatingly slow update it deems necessary for reasons even Microsoft probably doesn’t understand. Otherwise they would not constantly update their crap.

The in the office haiku

In my back a sound – 
if short, it’s the rolling of
a tire, if long: rain

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
It turned out to be short. Since there was no engine noise, it must have been an electric car or a hybrid in electric mode. Can such dissimilar sources cause similar sounds? But both alternatives presented themselves to me without conscious reflection as I was sitting in my office with my back to the window, not bothering to turn around to verify.

He thinks he'll keep her (haiku #2318)

Clock. Carpenter. My.
Close to midnight. YouTube playing.
He thinks he’ll keep her.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
Pieces of disjointed truth and nothing but.

The perfect life haiku

She wanted a life
as perfect as what you see
in advertising.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
One of the common experiences with advertising is that you don't necessarily get what was advertised when you buy the product. Advertising has that special knack of making things look better than true. And an old wisdom says that if something looks too good to be true it most likely isn't true. Like the kind of life generally portrayed by advertising. It's better to think of it as staged and paid bliss, I'd say, subtracting at least 75 percent as a reality penalty.

Love for Sale 2

Della Dartyan in a still picture from Love for Sale 2

Love for Sale 2 is a 2019 Indonesian film directed by Andibachtiar Yusuf starring Della Dartyan (shown in photo), Adipati Dolken and Ratna Riantiarno.

Probably the one and only Indonesian movie I've ever seen. Considering that I don't speak the language and had to go by the (sometimes atrocious) English subtitles, I probably missed out on a lot. 

Being more of a character study, the film moves slowly and therefore takes patience. Even though there is budding romance between Ican (Dolken) and Arini (Dartyan), the hired girl Ican has introduced to his family because he is tired of his mother's wedding plans for him, this film is more focused on portraying a number of family members and other characters in a realistic manner.

Would I recommend watching this film? Yes. However, those who expect a racy love story due to the title will definitely be disappointed.

The monosyllabic haiku

Oh! So, no if but 
and or what not like that true
no, no, it ain’t bro.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2020)

Note
The year and my blogs have gotten off to a slow start – took me until February to even think of posting something. And now it’s this mono-syllable thing that doesn’t say much, does it? Yes, I think it could be safely said that it is somewhat reticent in the meaning department.