“Historically speaking,…time is wasted; poetically speaking,…time is found in the act of visionary creation” (Crewe 400). Poetry allows us to capture an otherwise lost moment in the blink of an eye. British poet Dylan Thomas and American poet EE Cummings are both known for recurring themes of the passage of time in their poetry. In Thomas's "Fern Hill" and Cummings's "Anybody Lived in a Pretty Town," both modern poets use a juxtaposition of paradoxes to express the irrevocable passage of time and the loss of innocence attributed to it. While Thomas projects his feelings of maturity onto a nostalgic site of his childhood, Cummings takes a more detached approach in telling a seemingly trivial and paradoxical story of "no one" and "anyone", which, through negation, tells a history of universal life. is a personal story, Thomas's nostalgic visit to a place where, as a child, he had spent time with his aunt. Through this sentimental revisitation, he becomes aware of the inevitable passage of time and the resulting loss of innocence. The poem was actually sparked by his visits to Fern Hill as an adult during wartime. After Thomas's hometown of Swansea, Wales, was bombed by the Nazi air campaign against Britain, Thomas's parents moved to their cottage near Fernhill Farm. “[Thomas's] visits to his parents during the war recalled the happy times of Eden, when he was young and thoughts of war were still distant” (Miller 99). In this poem he revisits both his own childhood and, symbolically, his country's pre-war childhood and innocence. “Everyone lived in a nice town” is less personal. A love story made trivial through the use of "no one" and "anyone", this poem plays...... middle of paper...... the beating of the clock social becomes almost deafening. Works Cited Cox, CB "Dylan Thomas's 'Fernhill'." The Critical Quarterly. 1 (1959): 134-38. Crewe, JV "The Poetry of Dylan Thomas". Theory. Pietermaritzburg, Vol.XXXVIII 1972: 65- 83. Davidow, Mary C. “Journey from the Apple Orchard to the Swallow-Crowded Loft: “Fern Hill.” English Journal 58 (1969): 78-81.Kidder, Rushworth MEE Cummings: An Introduction to Poetry New. York: Columbia University Press, 1979. Miller, Tyrus. “Essay on Poetry for Students.” Gale, Guy. “Nature, Time, and Transcendence in Cummings' Later Poems.” & Co., 1984. 283-302. “Everybody Lived in a Pretty Town.” Wegner, Robert E. The Poetry and Prose of EE Cummings. & World, Inc..., 1965.