MERRICK SQUARE MARKET: A Travelogue
The screen door slams and the headlines
cry Ike! and Ted Williams! while the
Philco way in the back cranks out
‘The Ballad of a Teenage Queen.’
My Red Ball Jets pad reverently
over the oil-darkened hardwood past
the register’s ka-ching-promise of
Indian head pennies in your change,
down the aisle of warped shelving
stacked like the Walls of Jericho…
the Prince Macaroni boxes elbowing
the Campbell Soup cans… through
the ripe-banana, apple-onion
medley with its pungent tang of
white cheddar from the big
cheesewheel-under-glass…
past glass-bottled, fresh, white milk chilling
in the refrigerated window display, bottle-
capped with collectable, redeemable,
half-dollar-size cardboard discs… and on
down to the back where sea-glass green
Coke bottles languish like lobsters neck-
deep in the ice water of the open-top
fire-engine-red holding tank beneath the
fading, once festive Fanta, Fudgesicle,
Moxie and Necco signs… and all those
dangling, amber banana-curls of
slime-gummy fly-paper, the houseflies
raisin-glued above the jaundiced jars of
pickled eggs, pickled spiced sausages, and
those wax-papered Italians stacked
atop the meat counter calling my name--