The Marshmallow Test

The Marshmallow Test

The marshmallow experiment was a study of delayed gratification performed on small children in 1972, led by psychologist and professor Walter Mischel at Stanford University.

 

Do they still dream of that soft, sweet snare,

and awaken, doing the dirty math of it?

 

A shame trap of a Shakespearian bargain.

To bite or not to bite, to take it or leave it.

 

Understanding neither will nor power,

for fifteen minutes they stare at a mirror, 

 

cover their eyes, and talk to themselves.

Four years old and their futures told.

 

Just a test with interest: eat 

the freakin candy and we’ll write you off.

 

Hey Mr Scientist: was she hungry?

had she had a hard day? 

 

Was that her favorite treat?

Hard choices, soft matters:

someone was watching.

Someone is still watching.

L.C. Gutierrez is a product of many places in the Southern USA and the Caribbean. An erstwhile academic, he now writes, teaches and plays trombone in Madrid, Spain. His work has been published in a number of wonderful journals, and is forthcoming in Notre Dame Review, Sugar House Review, Trampoline Journal, New York Quarterly, Ponder Review and Delta Poetry Review.  He is a poetry reader for West Trade Review, who fuels on sweet, dark chocolate.