Love is an Orange
The thing is that love can be a source of great joy but also immense pain, a duality that is explored by Alessia Di Cesare in her poem, "The Side Effects of Eating Too Many Clementines." Following the loss of a loved one, the poem’s speaker uses their love for clementines as a metaphor to express their emotions following the end of a relationship and the love that still lingers despite the pain. Cesare’s use of language and imagery provides a deeper understanding of the hardships faced while navigating love and loss.
The poem begins with the image of boxes full of clementines in the kitchen, which is quickly followed by a confession of love: "There are boxes of clementines / in the kitchen and the thing is that / I love you again…" (Cesare 1–3). The speaker reveals that despite going through a period of difficulty and estrangement, they still have feelings for their former
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They further develop the metaphor of clementines illustrating the difficulty of letting go of their lingering emotions by likening them to the rinds of an orange: "But now the only pain left is left / in rinds, and there are plenty of ways / to remove it from the heart." By acknowledging they know ways to remove the rinds, it creates a sense of hope that the speaker is ready to begin healing. However, they immediately crush this new hope by stating, "I won't do it, though. Instead, I will / mock the break with more breaking / and eat all the clementines again." (13–15). They refuse to let go of the past and choose to "mock the break with more breaking," deliberately causing more pain instead of trying to heal. This can be interpreted as a coping mechanism where the speaker is using the physical pain from eating the fruit to distract themself from the emotional pain of loss. In this way, they are able to assert a form of control over their otherwise overwhelming