First Love by Alicia Ostriker grabs a hold of the reader and nearly makes you feel the pain and sorrow that the mother had felt for her daughter in the poem. The poem is about an innocent teenager that is haunted by her boyfriend's invisible presence which permeates throughout her home. The author in this particular poem, does not state at any point if the daughter is displaying her grief amongst her family and friends. Although, I believe that it is impossible for her to hide it, for her mother is telling about her suffering from what she sees. Love is a passionate feeling for another person or thing that can be felt in a variety of shapes and sizes. Grief is a constant suffering that is not easy to escape. In most cases, grief is caused by a lost love. Grief is an intense emotional pain as a result of a loss, in this case it is love.
In the beginning of the poem in (lines 1-3), Ostriker says "When the child begins to suffer, the mother finds in her mouth those burning coals, You can neither spit out nor swallow".
Ostriker is exhibiting certain words at the end of each line to stick in your mind and show that these specific words symbolize her daughter's pain. Words such as mother at the end of the first line, meaning the origin or source of something, a human being. A female who mothers a child, whether it be biological or adopted, has a certain kind of love for that child compared to anyone or anything else. She is feeling the suffering that her offspring is feeling, maybe not exactly, but she can imagine. Another word at the end of the second line is coals, she wants the reader to imagine the pain of hot coals inside your mouth. Ostriker is comparing the extreme pain of hot coals burning in the mouth to the loss of her daughter's first love. Those burning coals in her mother's mouth, symbolize a painful agony that she is going through because she feels for her daughter. The reason why she can't spit out the pain and if swallowed, perhaps would be even more painful.
