lips

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of lip.

   She painted her lips a deep red before the party.

   The baby's lips curled slowly into a smile.

   Note

   The ordinary plural, formed with a plain -s. It carries most meanings of lip: the pair around the mouth, the edges of a wound, the rims of jugs and bells, the edges of high ground. The exception is the slang lip of backtalk, which is uncountable, so a cheeky child gives you lip, never lips. The same spelling is also a verb, including the London slang for kissing.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of lip.

   The long putt lips the rim of the hole and spins out at the last second.

   He lips the mouthpiece carefully before sounding the first note.

   Note

   Here the -s is only an ending on the verb lip, whose uses run from touching something with the lips to water lapping a surface or a ball lightly touching a rim. Keep it apart from the kissing verb, which treats lips as its base form and inflects it again: lipses, lipsing, lipsed. So a musician lips the mouthpiece, but in that slang someone lipses a partner.

Showing meanings only. Show all 3