///Bread, House, Salt, God —the family of simple monosyllabic words.–from Another Country, a memoir by Adam Zagajewski; Bread House Salt GodJim Culleny The tsunami scent of yeast flooded our housein the mornings my mother baked bread. Up through floorboards it came;up the stairwell.  It spreadstirring our dreamselves awake. Baked bread A bell for the nose,…

///Two DeathsJim Culleny 1. Mirror Under cover of light the moon disappears;goes just like that, following my mother;travelling not by casket, but insteadby memory and dream, alikeas death and birth, so alike there’s just this mirror between them. 2. Da’s Marker In a cemetery overlooking what used to be a lakemy father’s stone’s a tiny…

/// Death is the least we have to fear.We are all in the hands of God,Whatever happens happens by His Will.             —Attention Please, by Peter Porter Until the Sacred Cows Come HomeJim Culleny Vishnu reclines and sleeps dreaming up the world. He lounges upon a coiled snake in the image of…

///What is Mind?  No matter.  What is Matter?  Never mind.–Bishop Berkley A Meating of MindJim Culleny If my braindoes not tell my arm what to donothing much will happen.Without a brain my arm isnot much smarter thana leg of lamb In fact, meatwithout mind is never going to get much done, whilemind without meatwouldn’t have…

///Don Q. in Mahattan–Biting the dust of ’01  Jim Culleny Dining in Soho alone, a manserved by a girl with lip studs, nose ring,and serpent tattoo uncoilingfrom deep cleavage,sees the new man of La Mancha,in dim light across the room,seated with his back to the street: He topples a pepper mill with his forkgesturing to…

///From the Indictment and Abjuration of 1633: “Whereas you, Galileo, son of Vincenzio Galilei … were denounced in 1615, to this Holy Office, for holding as true a false doctrine … namely, that the sun is immovable in the center of the world, and the earth moves … We pronounce, judge, and declare, that you…

///Humor and LightJim Culleny Even in gloomyshuttered rooms one beammanaging an invasionthrough impossible slitsreaches to whereshadows rule one joke, a laughone light remembranceand dis-ease for an instantdisappears Punch lines and photonscomedians and brilliant sunstake us as close to godas anyone need be //

///CommunicationJim Culleny A short-haired yellow muttstanding at the side of the roadwearing a day-glo orange scarf around his neckso as not to get whackedsteps boldly out as I approachas if to test for interspecies respect. I slow and stop, roll my window down, and bark, “Cool scarf.” He looks me in the eyeturns on his…

///Girl on Trapeze—Vignette through a windshieldJim Culleny……………………………………..Young chick at a curb waiting for a green. It comes, she goes head downchecking out the cut of her jeans:how they lay across her shoes;the way the inseams hug her firm thighs;the fine, faded blues. Sweet on self, she imagines an approaching guysees what she eyes: sees himself…

///“I don’t think I ever was a child.” –Coleman Hawkins, top sax jazzman Jazzman Said I don’t think I ever was a child Was I a child?I don’t think so If I ever was a childI’d know. …I don’teven know, Jazzman said,if a child ever was Child, Jazzman said, I don’t just thinkI play jazz…

/// Unworthy GuideJim Culleny ……….. This is the fabulous story of Heracleitus, the philosopher of Flux  This is the very short version, in which super-misanthropic Heracleitus, who has shunned the family of Man, returns to the city from years in the woods a very sick man with bleak prospects.  He returns to find a cure…

///The Pool of Buddha’s EyesJim Culleny The asphalt of the walk to the door is blackbut not as dark as the silence of the concrete Buddha on the porchas I climb the steps to work. The Buddha sits center on the top stepwith downcast eyes, a nascent nest in his hands, eyeing bits of straw…

///Tabula RasasJim Culleny In our town new mothers spring up like weeds.They roll fold-up strollersalong Bridge Street ortote sleeping babes that loll liketot marsupials in sacksstrapped across breasts:gene parachutestrussed over shouldersand buckled in back. A moment agothese moms were totmarsupials too. Now, out of nowhere–ignorant as saints or immune from despair, or both–they come toting…

by Jim Culleny in a blink the sun comes upover mountains sublime and the sea laps its brim like a pup regal elms come and gosplayed trunks broken by blightlimbs corrupt future and past collidewinds whistle side by side bodies touch and often burn up wars ragescriptures are taughtgood and bad divide killers are caughtdoors…

//Blue under BlueJim Culleny We were sitting on a bench under blue under the bush of a willow admiring her garden whenI saw an Indigo Bunting but didn’t know it when I did. Look, I said, a bluebird on the wall! No, the fabulous near-turquoise of it,its deep and tiny beyond-blueness makes itan Indigo Bunting,…

///Backyard HaikuJim Culleny Damn!under a flat rockthe chipmunk, scooting, is gonethe cat’s tail twitches. Politicsbefore time runs outit’s important to breathe freeat least once, no less. SuddenessA cat waits underthe wisteria, so cool.A bird flies too low. Chimineahere’s the fire, red inthe chiminea, flamingin fall before snow. Emissionsit’s snowblower timeyellow overalls appearexhaust and white plumes…

///Everybody Loves Their ToolJim Culleny Word has it that in the beginning was the word and that may be true but(just as a matter of shameless self-promotion), it’s clear that opener was written by a bard If the same thought had sprung from a painter it would have read:In the beginning was the line or…

///A Weekend in the Garden of My SixtiesJim Culleny Two days behind a roto-tiller panting like a spent muttyou get to meditating on poor Yorick’s skull. Barely holding back the stallions of a Briggs and Strattonyou smell the nearness of becoming void and null. You wonder how’s my ticker doingand will I soon me caving…

///Hazy Moon Jim Culleny Last night I almost hugged the hazy moon, that crazy bubble in the skywho is ever entering new phases. She rose red, round, and hugeas a melon of imagination. She loomed listening to the pine pitchand birch bark, an ear for the night choir.She tugged,I leaned as she rolled higher. Two…

/// Frida Kahlo’s BrowsJim Culleny Who would not be blown awayby Frida Kahlo’s brows? They soar over her eyes like a crowbroad      black      wings      spread two hooded planets in its gripscanning for a place to light and dine the back-to-back parentheses of her nose poised beneath, but above the pursed lips of…