Chocolate Poems

Famous poems (mis)remembered by Peter Mansbach, aka Mr Choc
These initially appeared on invitations to the 13 annual chocolate parties (1985-1997)
©Peter Mansbach. No commercial use without written permission.
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The Song of Hiawatha
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Peter Mansbach

By the shores of Gitche Gumee,
By the shining chocolate water,
Stood the truffles and the brownies,
Chocolate chips inside the brownies.
Dark behind them rose the layer cake,
Rose the dark and chocolate flour dough,
Rose the creamy mocha frosting;
Bright before it flowed the chocolate,
Flowed the rich and sensuous chocolate,
Flowed the shining chocolate water....

And he named her from the chocolate,
From the Aztec drink he named her,
Minnecoco, Chocolate Water.

Ode on a Chocolate Urn
John Keats and Peter Mansbach

"Beauty is Truth, Truth Chocolate" - that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to know.


Kubla Khan
Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Peter Mansbach

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A chocolate pleasure-dome decree,
Where Alph, the mocha river, ran
Through layer cakes measureless to man
Down to a truffle sea.


The Raven
Edgar Allan Poe and Peter Mansbach

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a dense and turgid manual of computer lore--
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly I heard a tapping,
'Twas the Raven, fast devouring chocolate goodies from my store,
Eating brownies, cookies, truffles, chocolate cream pies, cakes galore--
--"Take thy beak from out my chocolate, take thee hence and eat no more."
Quoth the Raven, "CHOCOLATE. MORE."

Stopping by Foods on a Chocolate Evening
Robert Frost and Peter Mansbach

Whose foods these are I think I know
His egg-nog's in the kitchen, though:
He will not see me stopping here
To scarf these brownies as I go.

The cakes are lovely, dark and sweet.
But I have cookies yet to eat,
And piles of chocolate foods to try,
And piles of chocolate foods to try.

The Charge of the Light Brigade
Alfred Lord Tennyson and Peter Mansbach

Chocolate to right of them,
Chocolate to left of them,
Chocolate in front of them,
Beckoned in wonder!

Theirs not to make reply
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to eat, and sigh.
Into the party of chocolate
Rode the six hundred.

Evangeline
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Peter Mansbach

This is the chocolate primeval. The murmuring fudge and the brownies,
Bearded with mousse, and in billows of cream, indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like bronzes of old...

Rich in their Cadbury covers, the mocha-filled neighboring pastries
Speak, and in accents of marzipan, answer the lure of the brownies.

Jabberwocky
Lewis Carroll and Peter Mansbach

'Twas brillig, and the slithy fudge
Did gyre and truffle in the wabe,
All Mansbach were the Häagen-Dazs,
And the chocolate outgrabe.

    Nursery Rhyme

Hickory, chicory, choc,
The mousse was in the wok,
The brownies rose,
The ice cream froze,
Hickory chicory choc.


The Declaration of Dependence
Thomas Jefferson and Peter Mansbach

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Chocolate. That to secure this Chocolate, Parties are instituted among Men and Women, deriving their just Desserts from the industry of the Participants....