Another way in which the author uses playful language other than using symbolism to reinforce the theme is his use of imagery. Often, when someone dies, like the ancient Egyptians who used to bury their dead with treasure which marked their belief in an afterlife, we pay their respects. The poem uses old newspapers and describes a dresser that is “lacking the three knobs” (line 10). This reinforces once again that the speaker does not believe in an afterlife or spirituality. He is looking at the dead as what it really is: cold and dumb. There is nothing further than that, no explanations necessary. Another image portrayed is when the narrator paints the picture of spreading the sheet to cover her face and says “if her horny feet protrude, they come to show how cold she is and dumb”(lines 13-14). She used to embroid pigeons on the sheet she is being covered with. The pigeons symbolize life or a new beginning or purity. Juxtaposing something that had meaning to her when she is alive with a lifeless body, makes the meaning that it had in her life insignificant. These images serve to deglorify death and also reveal the bare truth of life.
The speaker uses images to help explain his perspectives on death by using figurative language. After playfully messing with the reader’s mind, the author then directs the reader back to his revelation of the truth of life. This is done by using a metaphor to compare the unveiling of truth with a lamp when he says “let the lamp affix its beam” (line 15). Death according to the speaker is like a small disturbance in ones life that just needs to recover or “affix” itself, and when it does we must continue with life. Let truths outshine all assumptions of what it might be and embrace everything as it is: a dead woman. The refrain “The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream,” is also a form of figurative language that helps support the theme(line 8,16). The author tells the reader that what drives and rules people is not God but their inner most desires. This resembles the Freudian perspective on human beings that we are driven subconsciously by our desires. He uses this metaphor to elaborate that death is no more or less than what’s in front of him.
Stevens uses rhyme to put emphasis on the theme, by using the poem’s rythmitic structure to support his point of view. There is only one rhyme in the poem that is strategically placed in the end of each stanza. Through out the lines where he playfully makes reference to sexual symbolism and imagery to flower his muddling with the readers mind there is no rhyme scheme because he wants the reader to get caught up in the playfulness. In the last couplets of each stanza, there is a rhyme scheme ”Let be be finale of scene, the only emperor is the emperor of ice cream”(line 7-8). At this point the author uses these lines to strip the playfulness away and hit the reader over the head with the truth. He underscores his main idea by only rhyming the refrain and the informative line to reveal the truth.
In conclusion, the theme is death. Stevens uses formal elements like symbolism, figurative language and rhyme scheme. They help reinforce the theme of the poem.
Works Cited
Stevens, Wallace. ”Emperor of Ice Cream.”Literature:
A Pocket Anthology. Ed.R.S.Gwynn.Penguin
Academics: New York, 2006.565-566.