COMMENTS FROM CONTEST JUDGE MARIE KANE:

While the title of this poem assumes a certain subject matter, its content totally surprises. Rich with sound, image, and language, "My First Kiss" situates the reader in the setting of the poem through resonant detail and specific imagery. The poet exhibits talent with expert line breaks, believable voice, and revealing character. The poem concerns the speaker's grandmother who fervently kisses her Hebrew prayer book, leaving lipstick marks on the pages that the poem's young speaker wants to kiss too.

The poem's structure, eight tercets and one quatrain, lends a formality that works well with the language and pace of the poem. The first three lines continue from the title, "It is the smell I remember. The waxy oil / odor when opened, the pages yellow / & flat from years of turning / liked warped vertebrae." This opening description of "the smell" of "waxy oil odor" and the "yellow & flat" pages "like warped vertebrae" demonstrate expressive detail, and announce that this "first kiss" is not what was expected.

The expressiveness continues in the next tercet with description of the book itself:

. . . . My grandmother
kept it in her left pocket & wore the scent
instead of perfume. . . .

Note how the writer reveals the emotional importance of the book (we don't know yet what kind) with "kept it in her left pocket"-obviously above her heart without mentioning 'heart'-the placement is significant. That the "waxy oil / odor" substitutes for the Grandmother's perfume also alludes to the book's emotional importance.

In the next tercet, the poet depicts the Grandmother's preparation to use her lipstick. The
speaker explains the ". . . slow search for the golden / tube in her purse & then the quick flick of / her wrist pushing the lipstick up & / to her lips." By slowing the Grandmother's actions, the writer visually intensifies the experience of opening a tube of lipstick. The adjective "golden" and the phrase "quick flick of her wrist" are pointed and specific.

It is not until the fourth and fifth stanzas that the book itself is identified and described in loving terms. The grandmother "would take the prayer- / book from her left pocket & balance / the faded Hebrew in her hands." Note the reverence with which the "prayer-book" is handled; she would hold it "cupped tightly as if it was [sic] made of / water, or dust, or nothing at all." I love the ethereal and imagistic sense given by this description.

Next, the speaker slows the action again with specific description of the lipstick used to kiss the book, which gives us the first emotional plateau of the poem:

. . . . On the
edges of her favorite pages there

were smudges of colors called paint the town
red & coral sunset & even pink #54 but it was not
the colors that mattered. It was the patterns

they left behind, the cracked fingerprints
of lips blooming out as she lowered to kiss
the page.

These sections are written with imaginative metaphor in "fingerprints of lips"; they also show that this writer has mastered pacing with finesse. The casual mention of lipstick colors that we visualize immediately, the belief that these colors do not "matter," but the fingerprint "patterns" of "lips blooming" do, and the excellent line breaks that slow the action, establish that this is a writer of assurance, control, and precision.

The poet could have concluded the poem here; it would have been a satisfying read. However, and wisely, this poet continues and changes the direction of the poem and tells the reader "One Saturday was different. I / was 8 or 9. I took the prayer / book from her hands & pressed my thin / unpainted lips to the outline of her on the page." What images are contained in those words! The speaker's "thin, unpainted lips" contrast with the Grandmother's "lips blooming" with the color of "red and coral sunset" or "pink 54" that mark the "outline of her on the page," which the child wishes to capture.

The last quatrain delineates the exact desires of the speaker, giving us the second, and most powerful, emotional touchstone of the poem:

I wanted the color to leave the paper & join me,
I wanted to wear it outside the lines. I kept my lips
there for the entire Shalom Alcheim. I could feel
the page pressing back. My eyes were closed.

With the title, "My First Kiss," the content is not at all what the reader expected; instead, we are taken to a place of religious reverence and respect. The last two lines are especially welcome in that they cleverly mimic what someone would say when kissing another-and not kissing a book-magnifying the experience in the poem.

The maturity and intelligence of the writing, the subtle yet quick movement, the expert use of line breaks and meaningful punctuation, all mark this poem as a first place winner. The poet uses surprising content, deft diction, and crisp syntax resulting in a rich reading experience. We await more poetry from this talented voice.

Thank you for the privilege of reading your work!

Marie Kane
Final Judge, Sarah Mook Poetry Contest
engmrk@aol.com