Meaning & use
kissing passionately
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Meaning
phrase
Kissing with strong emotion, desire, or romantic intensity.
Grammar: This is a verb phrase acting as a unit; it can follow 'was' or 'were' (They were kissing passionately.) or stand alone as a caption or description.
Patterns
- be kissing passionately
- start kissing passionately
- kissing passionately with someone
In the final scene, the couple were kissing passionately on the beach.
They started kissing passionately as soon as the door closed.
He remembers kissing passionately under the streetlight.
Common combinations
- kissing passionately in the rain
- The film ends with them kissing passionately in the rain.
- kissing passionately for the first time
- She describes kissing passionately for the first time.
- caught kissing passionately
- They were caught kissing passionately behind the school.
- kissing passionately on the lips
- The song is about kissing passionately on the lips.
Synonyms and how they differ
- making out
- Informal and often suggests longer, more physical kissing; 'kissing passionately' is more neutral and romantic.
- snogging
- British informal; it means kissing for a long time, but sounds less serious or romantic than 'kissing passionately'.
- smooching
- Informal and playful; it can mean any long kiss, while 'kissing passionately' emphasizes strong feeling.
Opposites
Practice
Choose the sentence that uses 'kissing passionately' correctly.
Choose one answer.
Option 0 uses the adverb 'passionately' to describe the verb 'kissing' in the past continuous. The other options use the adjective 'passionate' or the wrong verb form.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “kissing passionately”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.