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.

Critical Can Opener

 

There’s nothing wrong
with this poem.
No need to look for it.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2024)

Note
A variation of Richard Brautigan’s poem of the same title, in which he says “There is something wrong with this poem. Can you find it?” (Quoted from Brautigan’s collection Rommel Drives on Deep into Egypt from 1970.)

At cHouse

 

A bartender who looks like Sandra the Hawaiian from Superstore mixed my drink this evening.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
The year’s about to end, so I decided to treat myself to one of those Italian bitters, and the above Japanese sentence renders the event as concisely as possible. No picture of the bartender – that would violate privacy laws.

What do I remember

What do I remember
of this light-weight day
above the hillside,
above dark shadows,
looking at blazing white
clouds in the distance?

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
Let’s leave it at that, shall we? More of a question about memory and what one remembers about one particular moment. Thank God for photographs – they greatly help with the task of reconstructing things gone by.

The photo taken from a chair lift above Campo Imperatore in Abruzzo, Italy, is by my real me, Johannes Beilharz. Leica R4, 50 mm Summilux, Adox CMS II 20 film.

Voice Message

    

Girl on metro is recording a voice message: “Sorry there were no advent calendars with 31 doors, so I had to get one with 24. Is that okay?”

My name is Luka – an ultrashort poem

My name is Luka

Now playing

Note For those not familiar, here's the song by Suzanne Vega from 1987 this alludes to:

Other than that:

Just don't ask me what it was.

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

No Regrets - one of the best break-up songs ever

Tom Rush performs No Regrets live

   

This gem, written in 1968, is probably Tom Rush's most well-known song, and it has been covered by other notable artists over the years (among them the Walker Brothers and Emmylou Harris). 

To me, his own rendition is the best and most touching by far. He has a great voice and is an excellent guitarist with a distinct style of his own.

From the lyrics:

No regrets

No tears goodbye

Don't want you back

We'd only cry again

Say goodbye again

6 lines

A grinder
is digging into the wall
painfully

And there’s
nothing
I can do about it

– Leonard Blumfeld (© 2023)

Note
The reported truth and nothing but. I could have added “except write a pedestrian poem about it”, but then it would have been more than 6 lines. And we wouldn't want that, would we?

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.

John Prine - Hello In There (Live From Sessions at West 54th)

Me and Loretta, we don't talk much now
She sits and stares through the backdoor screen
And all the news just repeats itself
Like some forgotten dream that we've both seen
(John Prine, from the lyrics of Hello In There)

This song has a story for me. I came to know it when I bought Diamonds & Rust by Joan Baez around 1975, the year it was released. Hello In There instantly struck me as one of the best songs on the album and made me aware of its composer, John Prine. As a result, I started listening to Prine and bought several of his albums.