We Are Mermaids

Burt (After Callimachus) explores pop culture, myth, and flora and fauna in her latest, a layered reflection on identity. In “Cabbage Whites,” which, like many of these poems, reflects on the trans experience, the speaker is a butterfly addressing others who have emerged from their states as caterpillars, who “were meant to be left and could be left/ amid our claque of leaves, each on our own,” but once transformed, “No danger, no inclement/ weather, no stalking or/ aerial predator/ can make us choose to live that way again.” In “At the Parkway Deli,” Burt describes childhood trips to a Jewish deli where she was drawn to the “world-famous pick-your-own-pickle bar.” Evocative descriptions include “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,” and the poem ends with the poet reflecting on how these visits foreshadowed the salt cravings common among women undergoing hormone replacement therapy (“You can know what you need/ before you know why”). In “Cinderella,” Burt remixes the fairy tale, “The trans story is the heroine has to be trans/ because nobody else in the capital shares/ her size.” Burt’s imagination is rendered in mellifluous, energetic language in this memorable book. (Oct.)