c:\@Work\Perl\monks>perl -wMstrict -le
"$_ = 'The <A} test {B> sentence <C} foo {42} bar {D> baz';
 ;;
 while (m{ \G .*? ({\d+} | {\w+> | <\w+}) }xmsg) {
   printf qq{'$1' };
   }
"
'<A}' '{B>' '<C}' '{42}' '{D>'