Much Later
Elephants and birds of beauty and a gold fish. Gold fish or a superstition. They always bring bad luck. He had them and he was not told. Gold fish and he was not old. Gold fish and he was not to scold. Gold fish all told. The result was that the other people never had them and he knows nothing of it.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on March 19, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.
“Much Later” appeared in A Book Concluding With As A Wife Has A Cow: A Love Story (Éditions de la Galerie Simon, 1926).
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein was born in Pennsylvania in 1874. An important figure among American expatriates in Paris, she was known for her experimental literature, including Tender Buttons (Claire Marie, 1914). She died in France in 1946.