First Kiss
This collision of teeth, of tongues and lips,is like feeling for the door
in a strange room, blindfolded.
He imagines he knows her
after four dates, both of them taking pains
to laugh correctly, to make eye contact.
She thinks at least this long first kiss
postpones the moment she'll have to face
four white walls, the kitchen table,
its bowl of dried petals and nutmeg husks,
the jaunty yellow vase with one jaunty bloom,
the answering machine's one bloodshot eye.
Ha, the first time I read this I was reading it too fast, and by the end I thought this 'first kiss led to domestic abuse. Especially after the Bloodshot Eye reference. Good thing I reread it. Good poem.
ReplyDeleteI like it. The author reminds me of Kelley Ashton from The Dart League King. It dreads the dull, lukewarm routine of her prescience (Vocab word :D) of her married life. She feels doomed to become a stay-at-home mom simply by kissing her date. 7/10
ReplyDeleteThe stereotype of the first kiss is that it should be romantic, you should see fireworks, yet for the narrator, her first kiss is lackluster, only a device to prolong her solitude. The four white walls suggest this solitude, her kitchen becoming her asylum. The poem goes against the grain of all teenage fiction in the world...I appreciate that. We've had too much of predictably happy endings.
ReplyDeleteI really like the first three lines. I don't know why. I think it's because he explains it with great detail, that you can picture it. And when he says "is like feeling for the door in a strange room, blindfolded" I think he is saying that the first time you kiss, it will be confusing, never-wreaking, and all around, weird. haha. I'm not sure if thats what he is saying or not, but thats how I see it :)
ReplyDeleteI think this poem is great! I love how the poem is called "Last Kiss". I assumed it was going to be a lovey-dovey poem, but when we read it I discovered that it defintaely wasn't. I kind of thought the poem was a bit depressing especially when it says "He imagines he knows her after four dates, both of them taking pains
ReplyDeleteto laugh correctly, to make eye contact." The way this was written makes it seem like even though these people have been out on 4 dates, they still don't know each other and aren't comfortable with each other. Overall, even though this was a bit depressing, I still really enjoyed it :)
This poem doesn't seem to be what it should. Reading the first few lines we think that the poem will mention how the first kiss is supposed to be great and be a great life time memory. Then halfway through the poem suddenly changes views dramatically. She seems to be set aside in alone and seems to be in a cold heartless environment. I think she realizes that this first kiss is just a kiss, and she will eventually have to face the truth and this love will have to end sometime. I think she shouldn't be thinking about ending the love after only her first kiss.
ReplyDeleteI really liked this poem. It's not something that happens to everyone in that way but to a lot of people. I liked how she used the simile, "this collision of teeth, of tongues and lips, is like feeling for the door in a strange room, blindfolded." It is very true of what happens in real teenage life. You don't know what your first kiss will be like and when it happens sometimes it doesn't stand up to what you thought it would be, just like this poem suggests that her first kiss was not what she expected but less. The line saying, "both of them taking pains to laugh correctly, to make eye contact," suggests that they feel like they have to stay in the relationship now that they have kissed like they are trapped. I think the comment about evading the four white walls lead the reader to think that she doesn't have a good home to go back to. It eludes to the fact that she is not happy with her life and this kiss is just a way to keep from thinking about it.
ReplyDeleteI think this poem is good, but also misleading. Normally when you think about, your first kiss is supposed to remind you of love and happiness, but in this author’s prospective, it reminds her of her future; the future that will keep her from doing things. I believe the four white walls is a place of confinement were she is trapped. A first kiss is supposed to be the opposite of that.
ReplyDeleteThis poem is definitely very interesting. The majority of society views a first kiss as a special moment between to people; however, April Lindner has a very different take on it. The author's diction (ex. bowls, postpones) portrays a negative outlook on the first kiss that is occurring rather than an optimistic view.
ReplyDeleteWhen you first read the title of this poem, you assume it is going to be happy and cute, about a teenage girls first kiss. After you read it you realize that the kiss is meaningless and is done just to keep her mind off of her reality. She is doing this as a way to escape the idea of being alone in the future. The kiss only reminds her of what it will be like when she is not with him anymore. This poem describes relationships in today's world perfectly. Many people date only to have someone there, not because they truly like the person they are with. Just like the girl in the poem who knows this relationship will not last and eventually she will be alone again.
ReplyDeletethis poem is good. When I first read it I thought it was going to be really cheezy and dumb but it had a twist to it. It was strange though that the girl in the poem thought the realtionship was not gonna last. Also it is kind of depressing in a sense that the vibe of it is different or not was is expected when it is first read.
ReplyDelete