Stone Soup

Where young artists paint the world with words

The international magazine of stories, poems, and art by young writers and artists. Published continuously since 1973.

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What is Now?

You are reading this poem now.

I wrote it “now,”
but by the time you’re reading it,

I will have written the poem in the past.

Oh, the functions of time!

Past, now, soon . . .

Time commands every word.

What is now?

It is gone, but will come again,

right now.