Stephanie Burt: Pick of the Week [ed. Terence Winch]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_______________________________________________________

At the Parkway Deli

 

You can know what you need before you know why.

For example, ten-year-old me, who leans

on the empty cold salad-bar cart along the cold wall

of the crowded dining room at the best Jewish deli

(supposedly, though they’re not kosher) south of Manhattan:

I’m waiting for noon, when the cart

becomes the world-famous pick-your-own-pickle bar.

“World-famous,” meaning

I wouldn’t stop telling my dad how much I liked it:

green sour tomatoes that pop

whenever you cut or bite into them,

intricate as a satellite inside;

sauerkraut in three colors, like some nation’s flag

left outdoors in a storm and shredded, maroon,

not quite white and pale-emerald green;

half-sours and dills, sliced lengthwise like canoes,

curled up at their tips like canoes;

banana peppers the shape

of your tongue if you stick out your tongue,

that also burn your tongue;

jade disks with peppercorns, sugary like tart candy,

yet not dessert, and good for you. How many years

till I found out why trans girls and women crave salt.

Coming out makes your blood pressure go down.

So do spironolactone, and other

similar shots and pills with jawbreaker names

I wanted to change me.  I would tell no one.

I would stand outside until I was 41,

waiting to be let in.  You can know what you need

before you know why: shredded cabbage and mini-cukes

and sodium ions in water, and vine-ripe tomatoes

preserved in mustard seeds, coriander, allspice

and vinegar for no one knows how long.            

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Stephanie Burt is Donald and Katherine Loker Professor of English at Harvard. Her latest books include We Are Mermaids (Graywolf), After Callimachus (Princeton UP), and Don’t Read Poetry: A Book About How to Read Poems (Basic). Ask her about Taylor Swift!

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

                                              Dessert display, Parkway Deli, Silver Spring, Maryland, 14 March 2024. Photo by T. Winch

       

Related Stories

• David Beaudouin: Pick of the Week [ed. Terence Winch]