II. Poems

      Vegetables

      Roots

      Parsnip

      Ah, parsnip, pallid winter root,

      Thou emblem, yes, thou very fruit

      Of fallow fields and frozen ways,

      I alone will sing thy praise

      Before I whack thee quite in two

      And add thee to this evening’s stew.

      Oh, vegetable melancholic,

      When people dine and drink and frolic,

      Thou liest in the basement bin,

      A beetle bumbling blind therein.

      Thou suffer’st yet the vilest taunts:

      You’re never served in restaurants.

Carrot

      At one time, they were plump and stubby,

      Not esthetic, far too chubby;

      Often gnarled, but always sapid,

      Carrots then were never vapid.

      Those sunny roots were full of savor,

      Sweet and juicy, earthy flavor.

      Carrots now are well designed,

      Slim and tapered, quite refined,

      But wooden, dry: they have no taste—

      For symmetry, gad, what a waste!

      Slice it, dice it, scrub it, pare it:

      We mourn the passing of the carrot.

Beet

      In Moscow:

      The blood-red beet, da, khorosho,

      We use him for our borshcht, you know.

      In other lands, tovarishch beet

      Is not considered quite so neat.

      In the suburbs:

      At cocktail party, barbecue,

      I’ve never seen raw beets, have you?

      Turnip, carrot, cabbage slice

      Dunked in dip is very nice.

      Yet palates can by beets be tickled.

      Like me, they’re at their best when pickled.

      In Cambridge:

      From Harvard, graduate cum laude,

      Served usually with quohog chowder,

      The beet has been an honored guest

      With Kissinger and all the rest

      At solemn rites when Derek Bok

      Asks famous grads to give a talk.

Radish

      Listen, you can hear the crunch.

      I eat a radish with my lunch.

      The radish, wisest of the roots,

      Is never cooked and only suits

      A relish dish, not a platter,

      Or plate or tureen, for that matter.

      Imagine radish casserole,

      Baked radish in a Pyrex bowl,

      Or think of radish under glass,

      A humble root gone upper class.

      The radish knows it’s best by far

      To love ourselves just as we are.

Rutabaga

      Forgotten, lost to our cuisine,

      Of noble turnip, first cousine,

      For rutabaga, royal root,

      Strike up the timbrel and the flute.

      That she at table proud may reign,

      From exile bring her back again.

      Ma grandmere served her every week,

      With mustard greens and ham and leek.

      Rutabagas are, mon dieu!

      At least as tasty as les choux.

Jicama

      Like the radish, it has crunch,

      But if you eat it with your lunch,

      You’ll find that it has little flavor,

      No zip, no oomph, no snappy savor.

      Overweight? The thing to do

      Is dine on jicama with tofu.

      Because that’s such a tasteless mess,

      You’ll lose weight through eating less.

      Tubers

Potato

      (To be read with a thick German accent.)

      At dinner, he is always gut,

      Mit Sauerbraten, hardy root,

      A glass of Bier, a glass of Wein,

      Kartoffel, ja, you’re immer fein.

      Vegetable democratisch,

      Not a snob or autocratisch,

      The rich, the poor, the bourgeoisie

      At table gladly welcome thee.

      Heil to thee, blithe tuber, spud,

      Who comes to us from out the mud.

      And now at the Oktoberfest,

      Salute the root that we like best.

      We raise our mugs in heartfelt toast.

      For Kartoffel, shout a “Prost!”

Sweet Potato

      The sweet potato, unlike yam,

      Is very seldom served with ham.

      In fact, it’s barely fit to eat;

      It’s mealy and not really sweet.

      When we find it’s