Momentary account

   

Rome, July 31, 2024

Burning heat, sometimes
crying of children, howling
of dogs, power cuts.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
Razor-edge-of-time reporting from the climate change front.

The drab streets haiku

 

Read today we should
all be grateful for any-
thing and everything

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
I really did read that today somewhere on the oh so social media. “Anything and everything” would include drab streets, right? Like the Roman street with its crumbling brutalist architecture eternalized in the photo above.

PS:
Anyone interested in drab street photos like the one shown here please get in touch!

A Korean move

Drop sideways onto
bed in desperation, then
sad eyes on pillow

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
Inspired by watching yet another South Korean TV series – Dr. Slump (2024). The photo is a film still of actress Park Shin-hye in a scene from this series.

Today’s observation haiku

Stout Roma woman
seated on a concrete block
outside the market

She had removed one 
sock and was massaging the
toes of her bare foot

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
The truth and nothing but.
Was this worth noting and being poeticized/documented?
Not entirely sure. But what’s done is done.

A lazy Sunday afternoon haiku

 

Sunny afternoon,
late January. At home
alone, cat sleeping.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
Razor edge of time reporting, glimpse of a time span that lasted for a while. I’d actually planned to write this in my head before I even got home. I knew that the cat would be sleeping. He does that about 16 hours out of 24.

Photography haiku

 

Found out this morning
I have neither spider web 
photos nor smoke pix

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Notes
I’ve been known to participate in some photography challenges where you’re invited to post a photo to match a given topic. This made me realize that I have nothing suitable for at least two topics. The above smoky picture is actually a fake – the interior of this room looks smoky but in reality the smoke was the result of a dirty window through which I shot the photo. As to spider web photos, I have nothing to show. Must try to look for webs!

The supersonic chewing power haiku

We are moths and can
infest everything! We then
lay a zillion eggs.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
A grim reality report from the afflicted kitchen.

A contemporary gesture haiku

Kiss your own palm 
ecstatically while LOL
and jumping up and down

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Notes
Gestural cloning is an essential part of (aspiring to) social media popularity. The above poem is based on one such gesture observed today. Do it, post it on tiktok (or wherever) immediately and get popularity!

For anyone unfamiliar with messaging abbreviations: LOL does not mean “lots of love” but “laughing out loud”. Seems to happen all the time in messages.

For purists: No, I did not quite follow the syllable count and don’t really GAFF.

A moocher haiku

 

A haiku and I
were having coffee at Star-
Bux. You pay! it said.

– Leonard Blumfeld

Painting by J. B. with a little help from Artifice. As can be clearly seen, the haiku is only present in spirit.

Las palabras y los días

También
hay unos días
sin palabras

– Leonardo Blumfeld (© 2023)

Nota
Hoy me he metido en vena castellana, inspirada por el libro de Octavio Paz con el título arriba.

Ala goes on a walk with grandpa

 

“Got to keep your eyes
on the ground, Ala!” – “Why? Are
there snakes?” – “No, dog shit.”

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
This year's first haiku published here, and on such a pertinent subject no less. It might not hurt, though, to occasionally remind a child that glides on wings (“Ala” means wing) of what's on the earth.

Blue

 

The year’s first haiku

Bla ble bli blo blu.

Foreign: blé blö blä blò blù.

And so are you too.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
Undoubtedly not a good start. Or is it? Symbolisms galore in the photo: something in the mirror while getting passed by the future.

The too little to live, too much to die haiku

Lenelio turned
seventy-seven today – 
work, like every day

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Note
The truth and nothing but. Like many old people in the so-called rich countries of the West, my friend Lenelio must keep working to supplement his government pension, which is too little to live on – even though it is too much to die, as the saying goes.

My Halloween Haiku

Unbreak my heart, sang

the grey monster chained up at 

the dark Illy bar.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Note
First-hand experience in Rome this afternoon as the whole city is getting ready for the carved pumpkin festival.

Photo by David Menidrey on Unsplash

Blues - a haiku

 

Irritable sky
then a classy big blues run
because of the greens

by Shinji Murakami

Note

Blame it all on the greens! An Internet-generated haiku based on personal input. The author chose to delete the poem from the site, which generated the following message:

Poor dog!

A random hot summer observation haiku

Lolling in her seat,
right hand hung out the window
like a wilted leaf.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Note
Everything wilts in this seemingly endless summer heat.

The that’s progress haiku

 

Some programmer got 
busy – made a box smaller,
saving room for adz.

– Leonard Blumfed (© 2022)

Note
The ugly truth and nothing but. Now that the Congrats box has been shrunk, Microsoft can not only display one ad but two at the same time! Pure genius! Just as we were getting undersugared from too few adz.

Terminology explanation
What are adz? Same as ads (advertisements), only much cheaper! It's like the difference between music and muzak.

Pardon me

 

  

if I sound naive, 
but is baited breath like bad
breath? Would like to know.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash

The Melinda haiku

 

Dear Melinda, stop
putting your label on all 
the apples you sell.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Note
Melinda is probably Italy’s best known producer of apples and pears. Its products can be found in most supermarkets throughout the country. And each fruit comes with its own little sticky plastic Melinda label. The company’s website goes on and on about sustainability, bio, etc. How about really doing something good and leaving off the damn labels? Not only are they a nuisance to remove but they also create waste. How important can fruit branding really be?

The snot catcher haiku

   

Silver horseshoe 
dangling from mademoiselle’s
dainty little nose.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2022)

Note
I occasionally wonder whether there is a practical reason for this facial jewelry...