Never Try to Trick Me with a Kiss
Never Try to Trick Me with a Kiss - form Summary
Refrain's Stubborn Return
Plath shapes the poem as a villanelle, using two refrains that recur at regular intervals. The repeated lines create a tightening, chant-like structure that insists on a bleak lesson: attempts to mask mortality and desire with consolations are futile. The circular form reinforces inevitability as varied images—doctors, lovers, birds—return to the same dismissive verdict, giving the poem a relentless, scornful rhythm and moral closure.
Read Complete AnalysesNever try to trick me with a kiss Pretending that the birds are here to stay; The dying man will scoff and scorn at this. A stone can masquerade where no heart is And virgins rise where lustful Venus lay: Never try to trick me with a kiss. Our noble doctor claims the pain is his, While stricken patients let him have his say; The dying man will scoff and scorn at this. Each virile bachelor dreads paralysis, The old maid in the gable cries all day: Never try to trick me with a kiss. The suave eternal serpents promise bliss To mortal children longing to be gay; The dying man will scoff and scorn at this. Sooner or later something goes amiss; The singing birds pack up and fly away; So never try to trick me with a kiss: The dying man will scoff and scorn at this.
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