use strict;
my $str = 'boxes
bags
boxesapple
boxapple
bagapple
bagsapple
unboxesapple
';
my $regex = qr/\b(?:box(?:(?!es)|es)|bag(?:(?!s)|s)|bxs)\K(?=[a-zA-Z])/mp;
my $subst = ' ';
my $result = $str =~ s/$regex/$subst/rg;
print "The result of the substitution is' $result\n";
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for Perl, please visit: http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html