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By Tom Clark

Then it was always

for now, later

for later.

And then years of now

passed, and it grew later

and later. Trapped

in the shrinking

chocolate box

the confused sardine

was unhappy. It

leapt, and banged its head

again. And afterward

they said shall we

repeat the experiment.

And it said

later for that.


Source: Poetry (December 2014)

  • Living

Poet Bio

Tom Clark
Tom Clark was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1941. He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan and won a Fulbright fellowship to earn his master’s degree at Cambridge University.He has worked as a poetry editor, writer and instructor in both America and England. Clark is also a respected writer in other genres of literature including biography, literary criticism and essays, novels and drama.

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