Rite Dove's " Chocolate "

This poem is about love and/or falling in love, and she compares this lover with chocolate. The taste, smell, and "velvet" feel are all descriptions used to describe both the concrete object (chocolate) and the abstract idea of falling in love with such person. The poem has a positive meaning about love and how one feels about falling in love based upon the diction utilized. For example, words such as "Rich"," pleasure", and "exquisite" were used to describe the way in which chocolate (or in other words, her lover) makes her feel as well as how they are towards her. The author's attitude is admiring or loving as well as playful. The poem shifts from a mood of somewhat hesitance to decisiveness period in stanzas 2 through 4, the speaker explicates how she will be vulnerable ( or "melt") if she indulges in this "chocolate". Yet, she decides to give in to it in lines 15 through 16 when she says "enough chatter: I'm ready to fall in love!" It can be said that the theme or central message of this poem is that love, like chocolate, is something that people want to indulge in, and those who are bold enough to be vulnerable for it will go after it before someone else comes along to take it.

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