Comments on 'Emperor'

This is a poem I've always had a fondness for, mainly because I suddenly 'got' the grammar of the sentence 'Let be be finale of seem,' one time as I was walking. Of course understanding the grammar doesn't immediately lead to understanding the poem. Here is the way to parse the sentence anyway: Let "be" be [the] finale of seem.

I found a site which gave several crictics' ideas concerning the poem. It is pretty clearly about a funeral. One critic mentioned that ice cream was common at black funerals in Key West, where Stevens was situated when he wrote the poem. The two stanzas of the poem are quite different. The first is very energetic and fun---a party-like atmosphere. The second is somewhat brooding and macabre. Covering the corpse with a sheet which fails to cover her "horny" feet. Note too that cold and dumb are loaded words, perhaps indicating a lot of grief and anger in the observer. Still, I'm not sure exctly what point Stevens is trying to make, if any. `The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream,' seems to indicate that the energetic life of the first room in the first stanza is primary, and at least one critic has made this interpretation, that the poem is an affirmation of life over death, but that's not so clear to me. After all the poem's title is also repeated in the second stanza. Perhaps the poem is a recognition of the juxtaposition of life and death present at the funeral, without any kind of affirmation in either direction. Other interpretations are possible too. The ice cream could be a detail that the narrator is concentrating on to maintain order in a chaotic emotional landscape. A refuge from the chaos of the reception and a refuge from the cold hard fact of death. I know when I am feeling down, or stressed, I can find comfort in small things. In this view, the sentence "let be be finale of seem," could refer to the verification of the person's death. She has only seemed to be dead to the narrator until he actually witnesses her corpse, when her death becomes a reality. In fact the first stanza of the poem itself can be seen as an elaborate buildup to the bald statement of the person's death. "Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, we present...a cold dumb corpse."

Well, I can see I am not going to plumb the depths here. I've already spent quite a bit of time thinking about this. Perhaps tomorrow, I'll post some other ideas.