Rainy December Day

It’s
as
if a
chasse d’eau were
continually 
being pulled today, and all grey.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2021)

Note
So I’ve come back to a form (fibonacci) I used to practice a lot for a while and then didn’t for a long time. Nothing but the truth in this one – the waters of the sky are coming down on Rome in varying degrees of mercilessness, and it’s so dark you can hardly call it day.

The Sunday morning wake-up fib

Not
a
thing is
better than
waking up from the
thunderous farts of a motor-
cycle at 6 a.m. right in front of your window

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2015)

Note
I know, I know – today’s not Sunday. But the thunderous memories from last Sunday kept inspiring me...

The free pizza online fibonacci

It’s
too
bad you
cannot get
free pizza online.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2015)

Notes

What brought this one about?

The majority of mankind is predictable, materialistic and stingy. Our billionaires are shining examples and everyone else would like to be like them. No news there. But on to the topic at hand ...

Why waste your precious money if you can get music, movies, art, novels, poetry, photos and what not for free on the Internet? Who cares about the idiots that actually create the stuff.

When, as technology and virtuality advance, pizza and other food and drinks will become available on the Internet for free, this will undoubtedly be THE BIG HIT.

What about the economy, though? After all, these are the tangible items that still turn over oodles of money. These are items even the stingiest have to pay for because there is no other choice.

Have you ever asked for a free copy of a pizza and been thrown out of the joint?

Have you ever noticed how easily people spend 25 $ or € per person at a restaurant to pay for items that cost perhaps 2 $ or € to make and/or buy, but when it comes to buying a book for 10 $ or € they grind their teeth and say they can’t afford it?

The Adolf fibonacci

That

name

never

did regain

popularity

 

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2015)

Note
I wrote this poem in my mind early this morning while still half asleep.
Initially it was going to be a haiku, but then the syllable count never worked out, turning the words around as I might, so it become a fib.
The poem was triggered by the 2014 Italian comedy Sapore di te watched last night, in which a girl owned a cat named Mao, which got into a fight with the neighbor's dog named Adolf. As a consequence, the respective pet owners accused each other of being fascist and communist.
When I grew up in Germany in the 1950s and 60s, there were still some Adolfs around, no doubt named after Hitler and born before May 1945. Nowadays, however, nobody in their right mind would name their kid (or pet, for that matter) Adolf. At least I would hope so.

101

My new book is out!

Leonard Blumfeld, 101

Contains 101 short poems (haiku and fibonacci)

From the cover text:

Leonard Blumfeld, a character sprung from a story by Franz Kafka, is the part of me that can take virtually any prompt, look at anything around, think of anything or anyone and make a poem out of it – be it humorous, deadpan, philosophical, silly, absurd or reticent. Many of these dash-down instant creations take an appropriately short form – like the haiku and fibonacci assembled here. They are poems about mundane events, such as enduring bad weather or looking at the meager contents of a fridge, about artists like John Singer Sargent or Amedeo Modigliani; they invoke music, like the poems based on classical Indian ragas, digest books read or comment on news events.

Can be ordered from Amazon.de or any bookstore in Germany. ISBN: 978-3844290943. Amazon.de also ships to countries outside Germany. The e-book version and printed version are also available directly from the publisher in Berlin.

Signed copies are available upon request and can be shipped internationally (please leave a comment).

James M. Cain, The Cocktail Waitress

James
Cain's
Cocktail
Waitress is
the potboiler that
is boiling in my pot right now.

– Leonard "Crime Reader" Blumfeld

First fibonacci in a long time ... written upon inspiration by Poets United.

So what fib no. 7

Did
get
a hair-
cut this week-
end, played games and drank
beer with friends. So what, you say, that
hardly broke ground. Oh,
I forgot
to men-
tion
this.

– Leonard “In Crisis” Blumfeld (© 2011)

The Atacama desert stone fib

Have
been
there for
two million
years, rubbed smooth by earth-
quakes – clang of a thousand hammers.

– Leonard "Deserter" Bloomfeld (© 2011)

Note
Scientists from the University of Arizona have discovered that earthquakes are the reason why the rocks in the Atacama desert in Chile are smooth even though there has been no water there for two million years. The Atacama is shaken by earthquakes with a magnitude of 5 or more every four months on average, so that the rocks have been subjected to an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 hours of polishing.

Optimism

For you

You
have
always
been good at
delivering the
worst for worst case scenarios.

– Leonard "Case Planner" Blumfeld

Elucidatory note
Why did I call this "Optimism"? Well, when you've become accustomed to expecting the worst and it becoming the worst, everything else is a positive surprise, right?
At least we're still on talking terms.
My dedications used to be "For her" – now that we're farther apart than ever I'm getting closer; they will be "For you" from now on.

Shopping

For her

I'm
not
that grey
box way back
behind the glossy
brands. No more. Have never been.

– Leonard "Branded" Blumfeld

The signals people send out are largely self-made. The grey box there at the back of the shelf must stop thinking of itself as the ugly grey box at the back of the shelf that nobody could possibly want.

Addendum
What does shopping have to do with relationships?
Ideally it should not, in my opinion.
A year ago or so I got into a discussion with HER about this. She'd more or less bluntly told me to look elsewhere, even citing some eligible females.
To which I replied that it wasn't like a supermarket where you picked a brand from among a few.
But perhaps I'm the one who's wrong.
She appears to choose according to rational criteria (and forget about the ones that really count).
But perhaps she's right – and I'm wrong, hiding my more complex shopping habits behind romantic (or merely sentimental) trim.

The cantankerous fib

Oh

my!

Am I

cantanker-

ous today. What louse

did walk across my liver?

– Leonard Blumfeld

And now to the explanatory part...
When someone is in a bad mood in Germany, one may ask "Was ist denn dem für eine Laus über die Leber gelaufen?" ("What louse did walk across his liver?") – so much for where that second part came from.
And what louse was it that walked across my liver? Mostly myself, I have to admit. I'm working hard on thinking of how to improve and avoid the potholes I've been stepping into in the future. As a first step, I shaved off the beard I'd been proudly wearing since about 1976. Now if that ain't a good or even significant start!

Reinventing the dog

This
old
dog has
been barking
up the wrong tree for
years. Another trick is needed.

– Len "Old Blue" Blumfeld

But then there's the saying "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." Ouch.

A world of friction

An attractive youngish woman dressed in some kind of frumpy lilac frock walked up to the desk that had been set up for the reading.
“Hi, my name is Frue.”
That surely had to be Sue, and I was about to quote Johnny Cash (“So how do you do!”), but thought better of it and smiled politely.
“I hear you’re a writer of friction,” said the woman.
“Of friction?”
“Yes, of froze.”
“Froze?”
I was beginning to sound very dull to myself, simply repeating her cues.
“Yes, froze, as fropposed to froetry.”
“That is true, I hardly ever write froetry. How about you? Are you a writer too?”
“No. I come from Frampton, which is near Frondon, and that is –”
“... in France?” I simply knew it had to start with an F and an R.
“What gives you that fridea? – No, it’s in Frotland, of course.”
“Which makes you a true Frot, I suppose.”
“Indeed, and I’m froud to be one.”
Was I ever going to snap out of this fruity world of friction?
I decided to steer the conversation back to the realm of reality ... err ... freality.
“So, Sue from Hampton, would you like me to sign a copy of my book for you?”
“It’s Frue and Frampton, and I don’t want you to frign a fropy of your frigging frook.”
“Oh?!”
“I came here for friction, and what did I get? Only frustration and fret.”
I frinally frinked my freyes – and that frid it.
Frue, with a frap of my froes, went up in a frume of froke.

– Leonard F. R. Blumfeld (© 2010)

Written for Sunday Scribblings and Friction.

The late phone call fib

For her, as usual

Late
at
night my
love did ex-
hibit the friendli-
ness of a steel brush when I called.

– Len "Will He Ever Learn" Blumfeld (© 2010)

Reality notes
What is it with her? You call and inevitably get the distinct frosty feeling she'd like nothing better than to shake you off the soonest possible. And it's not like I call at uncivil times, either.
But perhaps I'm only ultraresistant to hints that are as clear as a totem pole.
Started this one with the first words of a song by Joan Armatrading that is among my all-time favorites:

I need you

Late
At night
I feel so lonely
Here's a body next to mine but I'm feeling cold

And baby in the morning light
When I look in some stranger's eyes
It's then I know that the need in me
Is really for your paradise

I dance
I sing
But there's something missing
Every night a different name to call

But you know when I hold 'em tight
I always give the game away
I try so hard to make it right
But it always ends up the same

You know I need you

I need you
Like I needed you
The first time we kissed
I need you
And I need you now
And I can't resist
Standing by your door in case you leave

I miss you mostly in the night
And I miss you through the day
I hate myself for hurting you
Yes I know I drove you clean away

You know I need you
But now I need you

(Written by Joan Armatrading, from me myself I, released in 1980)

Soledad en …

Some­‑
times
there is
nothing as
lonely as a crowd
milling merrily around you.

– Leonard "Master of Truisms" Blumfeld (© 2010)

Written for One Single Impression and Lonely. The title, added retroactively, alludes to García Lorca's Poemas de la soledad en Columbia University from Poeta en Nueva York (1930).

Roads and roads and roads

Roads
and
roads and
roads I've been
on lately - black and
grey and long. Roads and roads and roads.

- Leonard "On the Road" Blumfeld

Written for One Single Impression and 'Roads' from on the road. I've been traveling in Utah and Colorado for the past two weeks. It's been a wonderful trip, and the roads, even though they were indeed black and grey and long, were great and took us through amazing landscapes.

The dreadful fib

For her

Is
there
any-
thing more dread-
ful than this heavy
silence that is now between us?

– Leonard "Some Release" Blumfeld

The ragged fib

What

can

I say?

You occur

quite ragged today.

Not your tidy self, my sweet elf.

- Leonard "Downright Ragged Himself" Blumfeld

Written to include occur, ragged and tidy from 3WW. Sweet, funny or merely insipid? You be the judge, dear reader.

Oedipal fib

Caught
up
with my-
self after
all: my mother is the
one I’m seeking in all women.

– Leonard “Finally Sly” Blumfeld (© 2010)

Note: There appears to be some truth to this – generally, the women that appeal to me are similar to my mother, usually in several respects: difficult, negative, depressive, coy, vain, capricious, gifted, always late. You may get a vague picture. I feel trapped.

The she is warming up to me after all fib

For my usual recipient of poetry

How
nice!
She did
not ask and
simply took a stick
of gum from the shelf in the car
as I was driving
her home. A
tender
start.
Yea!

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2009)

Based on a true occurrence a while back.