"Historically speaking,...time is lost; poetically speaking,...time is regained in the act of visionary creation" (Crewe 400). Poetry allows you to capture an otherwise lost moment in time in the blink of an eye. The British poet Dylan Thomas and the American poet E.E. Cummings are both known for recurring themes of the passage of time in their poetry. In Thomas's "Fern Hill" and Cummings's "Whoever Lived in a Fair Town," both modern poets use a juxtaposition of paradoxes to express the irrevocable passing of time and the loss of innocence attributed to it. While Thomas projects his mature feelings into a nostalgic place from his childhood, Cummings takes a more detached approach by telling a seemingly banal and paradoxical story of “nobody” and “anyone,” which through denial tells a universal life story. "Fern Hill" is a personal tale, Thomas's nostalgic revisiting of a place where he spent time with his aunt as a child. Through this sentimental revisitation, he realizes the inevitable passage of time and the consequent loss of innocence. The poem was actually triggered by his visits to Fern Hill as an adult during a time of war. After Thomas's hometown of Swansea, Wales, was bombed in the Nazi air campaign against Britain, Thomas' parents moved to their cottage near Fernhill Farm. "[Thomas's] visits to his parents during the war awakened memories of the happy Edenic times when he was young and thoughts of the war were still distant" (Miller 99). In this poem, he revisits both his childhood and, symbolically, his country's pre-war childhood and innocence. “Anyone who lived in a nice city,” is less personal. A love story made banal by the use of "nobody" and "whoever", this poem sounds... in the center of the paper... the ticking of the social clock becomes almost deafening. Works Cited Cox, C.B. "Dylan Thomas's 'Fern Hill'." The critical quarterly. 1 (1959): 134-38. Crewe, J.V. "The Poetry of Dylan Thomas." Theory. Pietermaritzburg, Vol.XXXVIII 1972: 65-83. Davidow, Mary C. "Journey from Apple Orchard to Loft Crowded with Swallows: 'Fern Hill'." English Journal 58 (1969): 78-81.Kidder, Rushworth MEE Cummings: An Introduction to Poetry. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979.Miller, Tyrus. "Poetry essay for students". Gale (1998). Rotella, Guy. "Nature, Time, and Transcendence in Cummings' Later Poems." Critical Essays on E. E. Cummings G. K. Hall & Co., 1984. 283-302. Turco, Lewis. “Everyone lived in a nice town.” Masterplots II.Wegner, Robert E. The Poetry and Prose of E. E. Cummings. New York: Hartcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1965.