Sen. John F. Kerry has catapulted into a 10-point New Hampshire lead six days before the nation's first primary, bouncing out of Iowa and over longtime frontrunner Howard Dean, according to a new Boston Herald poll. 

The Massachusetts senator leads Dean 31 percent to 21 percent, with a slipping Wesley K. Clark at 16 percent after skipping the Iowa caucuses.

Sen. John Edwards is in fourth place with 11 percent, followed by Sen. Joseph Lieberman with 4 percent. Rev. Al Sharpton and Rep. Dennis Kucinich continue to barely register.

Herald pollster R. Kelly Myers called it a ``dramatic turn-around for John Kerry.'' His once fledgling campaign has found new legs and he now finds himself the clear front-runner in this race,'' Myers said.

The poll, of 501 likely Democratic primary voters, was taken by RKM Research and Communication Tuesday and yesterday in the immediate aftermath of Kerry's surprise Iowa caucus victory. The poll's margin of error is plus or minus 4.4 percent.

The Herald poll is the first two-day sampling since Iowa's vote. It shows a startling turn-around from the Herald's pre-Iowa poll of New Hampshire voters published last week. In that poll, Dean led with 29 percent and Clark surging into second place with 20 percent. Kerry was lagging in third five points behind Clark. For Kerry, it marks a sea-change in fortune in his neighboring state - which has suddenly gone from potential embarrassed to the spot where he could begin to steamroll candidates out of the race.

Kerry's charge is bolstered by soaring popularity, with 77 percent of voters viewing him favorably and just 18 percent seeing him unfavorably. That rating jumped significantly from the 54 percent favorable and 27 percent unfavorable ratings Kerry had in the Herald's pre-Iowa poll.

Voters think Kerry has the best shot at beating President Bush, has the best foreign policy resume and will best handle domestic issues like health care and education, the poll found. At the same time, the poll shows New Hamphire's love affair with Dean slipping after his 20-point Iowa loss to Kerry. Dean's favorable rating dropped from 66 percent in the pre-Iowa poll to 56 percent today while his unfavorable rating climbed from 21 percent to 34 percent.

The poll also shows a huge flip among who voters of all stripes think will win the primary - a good measure of expectations. While 72 percent of voters thought Dean would win before the Iowa vote, only 30 percent think the former Vermont governor will pull it out today - 38 percent say Kerry will win.

Even more striking, according to Myers, only 6 percent of voters said Kerry would win the Democratic nomination before Iowa and 40 percent say he will now. Though still out of striking range in head-to-head match-ups, Sen. John Edwards is also apparently enjoying a strong push after his third-place Iowa finish, the poll found. Edwards had a huge jump from 5 percent in pre-Iowa surveys, is nearly catching Clark for second place and saw his favorable rating jump from 52 percent to 69 percent.

``Despite this increase, Edwards' improved image has not yet translated into significantly higher electoral appeal in New Hampshire,'' Myers said.