One hundred eighty seven
fat to midland bulbs Pat pulled
from earth two days before
lay in front of me now
arrayed like skulls of little people,
root tufts sprouting from tops
like hair on shrunken heads
They lie in their leafy finery, but dry,
crusted with the dust of their nativity,
unlike Lazarus who lived and died first
and was then placed in earth only to be,
not long after, called from it
at the insistence of a persuasive saint
—pulled forth he was,
having just settled in for the
long snooze
But these little white domes
were birthed from dirt and now,
as if awakened on this folding table,
as if laid out in Portugal’s Church of Bones
now at rest among peers, sharing
their redolent scent of Italian kitchens,
(a memory of the nosey marinara music
rising in my own bony dome)
as if to say,
……………… “All of us here,
each cloven skull,
together divine,
play this olfactory chorale
from a plastic dais
for you and any nearby neighbor
coincidentally sniffing air”
“Here we cure,” they coo,
“cooling our leaves
in open shade, in breeze with
Oscar Peterson pianoing
from Pandora, flowing
through the spigot
of your smart phone,
content,
though sacrificial,
as is the fate
of all lucky
garlic, and
…… you
…… you
oblivious
daydreaming
gourmet”
Jim Culleny
8/5/18
Blink 