diff --git a/src/Text/Pandoc/Readers/HTML.hs b/src/Text/Pandoc/Readers/HTML.hs
index ac3947ad1..caf2b7f5f 100644
--- a/src/Text/Pandoc/Readers/HTML.hs
+++ b/src/Text/Pandoc/Readers/HTML.hs
@@ -395,7 +395,8 @@ definitionListItem = try $ do
 -- paragraph block
 --
 
-para = htmlTag "p" >> inlinesTilEnd "p" >>= return . Para . normalizeSpaces
+para = try $ htmlTag "p" >> inlinesTilEnd "p" >>= 
+             return . Para . normalizeSpaces
 
 -- 
 -- plain block