A Lengthy Consideration of Wallace Stevens

" Who is the Emperor of Ice Cream?

Stephen King used lines from the poem as an epigraph to one of his books, and I fell in love with Wallace Stevens's poetry.  Perhaps in high school we had some brief exposure to something like "The Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock" (which, by the way, a junior or senior may enjoy, but cannot under any circumstances understand in a way that has any meaning or reality for them); however, it was encountering this poem in a Stephen King book that pushed me out to the stores to find Wallace Stevens, who has been ever since a life-time companion and a good guide.

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