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--