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A Choice by Paul Laurence Dunbar

Analysis

"A Choice" is a poem written by Paul Laurence Dunbar. This poem is about Dunbar's wishes of reading poetry that makes him feel better or become a better person and not reading sermons specifically about heeding the wrongs of life. A "dew drop in a honey cup" means something sweet and perhaps romantic. "[S]pirit-wine of a singing line" means something good for the soul.

This poem consists of only one stanza made up of eight lines. However, the indentions allow for a rhythm break (and thus change in poem direction) that is similar to stanza breaks. The poem is rhymed ABABCCDD.

Poem

A Choice
By 

They please me not - these solemn songs
That hint of sermons covered up.
'Tis true the world should heed its wrongs,
  But in a poem let me sup,
Not simples brewed to cure or ease
Humanity's confessed disease,
But the spirit-wine of a singing line,
  Or a dew drop in a honey cup

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