The Dead Stay Useful in the Kitchen

Lyrics

[Verse 1]
Tuesday is the day I cook
Not because Tuesday means anything
but because Ba ngoai cooked on Tuesdays
and when I asked her why
she said because Wednesday
needs something to look forward to
The market on Rue d'Aligre
has a woman who sells lemongrass
that smells almost right
Almost is close enough
when you are six thousand miles
from the original
I buy ginger by the hand
not the gram
because Ba ngoai measured ginger
by how it felt in the fist
and the fist
was the first scale
[Verse 2]
Giai vi nhu Ba day
I season the way grandmother taught
which is to say
I season without measuring
which is to say
I season by listening
to the oil
The oil has a voice
Before the garlic it whispers
With the garlic it talks
After the lemongrass it sings
and if you have missed the singing
you have waited too long
and Ba ngoai would know
from the next room
by the sound alone
that you waited too long
She never entered the kitchen
to correct me
She just cleared her throat
from the chair
and that was enough
[Pre-Chorus]
Nau an la noi chuyen voi nguoi da mat
Cooking is talking with the ones who left
The recipe is the language
The heat is the grammar
The salt is the punctuation
and the grandmother
is the accent
you can never
quite reproduce
[Chorus]
The dead stay useful in the kitchen
Their hands are in my hands
when I bruise the lemongrass
with the back of the knife
at the angle she showed me
when I was seven
and the kitchen was in Hue
and the lemongrass
was from the garden
not from Rue d'Aligre
I cook and the apartment fills
with a smell that does not belong
to this century
or this country
and the neighbors knock sometimes
and I say it is just dinner
but it is not just dinner
it is a woman
who has been gone for twelve years
refusing to leave
the one room
where she is still
needed
[Bridge]
Canh chua ca
sour fish soup
Her version not the restaurant version
not the version that explains itself
to tourists
Her version that assumes
you already know
why the tamarind is there
and does not apologize
for the bones
I leave the bones in
the way she left them in
Not because they add flavor
which they do
but because removing them
would be editing her
and I do not edit
the dead
The broth takes four hours
I have a phone and a window
and the sound of something
becoming what it was
always supposed to become
and four hours
is not a long time
to spend with someone
you miss
[Final Chorus]
The dead stay useful in the kitchen
Their timing lives in my wrists
The flip of the crepe
the shake of the pan
the moment the caramel
turns from patience
to attention
are all inherited gestures
from a woman
who is standing
right behind me
every Tuesday
in a kitchen in Paris
that smells like Hue
and I am not sad
I am accompanied
Nau an la yeu thuong
Cooking is love
She never said it
She just cooked
and the cooking
said it
every time