Paul Klee's Angelus Novus

Paul Klee’s Angelus Novus reminds
me of Alexander Blok, Yesenin
too, overcome; and now we may find
it on display in Jerusalem.

We are back to that kind of disaster,
and I do not think that we shall keep clear
of falling rubble and burning plaster.
The claw-footed Cupid hovers near

the ongoing catastrophe, with wings
tacking backwards; but as Bukharin said,
the poet did not say, the one last thing
possible for him to say, though he plead

mutedly. Godspeed is not fast enough.
Wind snatched out that word, and bore it aft.

Woodford Halse - 25 June 2025

I refer to the Angelus Novus monoprint ( 1920) by Paul Klee ( 1879- 1940) that was owned by Walter Benjamin ( 1892 - 1940) and Gershom Scholem ( 1897 - 1982), and looked after by Georges Bataille ( 1897- 1962), and Theodor Adorno ( 1903 - 69) until Scholem could receive it. It is now exhibited in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.

Alexander Alexandrovich Blok ( 1880 - 1921) and Sergei Alexandrovich Yesenin ( 1895 - 1925) are Russian poets from the 1920 of the Angelus Novus who remind me of the angel.

Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin ( 1888 - 1928) was a Bolshevik and Soviet Politburo member. who was purged and liquidated by Stalin after a show trial. Both he and Trotsky made memorable tributes to Blok. The last line refers to the startling conclusion of Blok’s famous poem The Twelve.