DDCPoetry

Original poem reprinted online here: "French Kissing" by Gregory Sherl Originally read: March 12, 2013 More information about the Poet:  Gregory Sherl I needed to read the "about the poem" the first time to understand that this is an allusion to Joan of Arc.  I did write down notes of what I thought about the poem the first time that focused on the idea of the "emasculated peace time."  But in my notes I didn't go further about that idea. And today, rereading the poem after a couple of months -- I still don't see the allusion to Joan of Arc,  how the poem operates with the allusion.  Actually I do in a sense, but my focus the entire time is the speaker, and there's little hiccups which makes me feel I have to know more about the history of Joan of Arc in a not interesting way. The poem starts off with a rhetorical question that does emasculate a man during peace time, "What is there left to do during a truce, but look at boys / swinging ...