Poem: On the Parkway Deli

This story is a part of “Queer As Meals,” a collection that explores the function of meals in LGBTQ+ communities.

On the Parkway Deli

You possibly can know what you want earlier than you realize why.

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

on the empty chilly salad-bar cart alongside the chilly wall

of the crowded eating room at the most effective Jewish deli

(supposedly, although they don’t seem to be kosher) south of Manhattan,

(households have to attend to be seated inside):

I am ready for midday, when the cart

turns into the world-famous pick-your-own-pickle bar.

“World-famous,” that means

I would not cease telling my dad how a lot how I preferred it:

inexperienced bitter tomatoes that pop

everytime you reduce or chunk into them,

intricate as a satellite tv for pc inside;

sauerkraut in three colours, like some nation’s flag

left outdoor in a storm and shredded, maroon,

not fairly white and pale-emerald inexperienced;

half-sours and dills, sliced lengthwise like canoes,

curled up at their suggestions like canoes;

banana peppers the form

of your tongue should you stick your tongue out,

that additionally burn your tongue;

and jade discs with peppercorns, sugary like tart sweet,

but not dessert, and good for you. What number of years

until I came upon why trans women and girls crave salt.

Popping out makes your blood stress go down.

So do spironolactone, and different

related pictures and capsules with jawbreaker names

I needed to alter me. I’d inform nobody.

I’d stand outdoors till I used to be 41,

ready to be let in. You possibly can know what you want

earlier than you realize why: shredded cabbage and mini-cukes

and sodium ions in water, and vine-ripe tomatoes

preserved in mustard seeds, coriander, allspice

and vinegar for nobody is aware of how lengthy.

Stephanie Burt is a professor of English at Harvard, and is the writer of a number of books of poetry and criticism, together with her most up-to-date, Do not Learn Poetry: A E book About How you can Learn Poems.