There is no enough in exile.
Finis
April 26, 2021
Issue 21, Issue 21 Poetry, Poetry
Whitney Bruno
After Surgery, My Father Helps Me Bathe
April 26, 2021
Issue 21, Issue 21 Poetry, Poetry
Devotion
April 26, 2021
Issue 21, Issue 21 Poetry, Poetry
Your mother is a creep.
Everyone’s mother is a creep;
we have envelopes of your teeth in our bedside drawers,
clippings of your hair. We check your browser history.
To Autumn: Reading Keats in Pandemic Winter
April 7, 2021
Essays
When I nurse my baby son Oliver to satisfaction, a beautiful look grows on his face. His small damp lips purse; his cheeks pinken; his black lashes rest delicately shut. If I try to offer more, those lips squash upwards in contented refusal. “You’ve o’er-brimmed his clammy cells,” my partner Paul always observes.
He’s quoting of course from that most beautiful of poems, John Keats’ To Autumn.
Sam’s Super Burger
March 17, 2021
Dispatches
Grand Bay, Alabama
Mother’s Tongue
March 9, 2021
Essays
I remember I was talking to a colleague in the break area of a 2017 translation conference when a tall, snowy-haired man came up to us. (I say “remember,” but my memory is hazy. We are told to forget these sorts of incidents.) The interaction went something like this: The man walked toward us and, without preamble, planted himself before me to ask if I knew a noted translator from Japanese. The translator is Asian-American, like me. (Or—maybe there was a preamble; maybe he asked us our names first.) I felt my smile gelatinize on my face. No, I said. I had never met that translator.
LitFest 2021: Poems by Tommye Blount and Natalie Diaz
February 19, 2021
Poetry
Amherst College’s sixth annual literary festival will take place virtually this year, from Thursday, February 25 to Sunday, February 28. Among the guests are 2020 National Book Award poetry finalists Tommye Blount and Natalie Diaz. The Commonis pleased to reprint four of their poems here.
Join Tommye Blount and Natalie Diaz in conversation with host John Hennessy (poetry editor of The Common) on Saturday, February 27 from 11am to noon.
Split Me in Two
January 20, 2021
Essays
Kamala Harris is a dougla.
Without italics, you might be tempted to think that’s a typo or just bad copyediting; that I mean to say she “is married to a douglas.” But, on the off chance you are of West Indian heritage, you know exactly what I mean. You know dougla is a real word and you know it means the new Vice President of the United States of America is half-Indian and half-black.
January 2021 Poetry Feature: Bruce Bond
January 14, 2021
Poetry
Happy New Year! We begin 2021 by welcoming BRUCE BOND back to The Common.
Bruce Bond is the author of twenty-seven books, including, most recently, Black Anthem, Gold Bee, Sacrum, Blackout Starlight: New and Selected Poems 1997–2015, Rise and Fall of the Lesser Sun Gods, Frankenstein’s Children, Dear Reader, Plurality and the Poetics of Self, Words Written Against the Walls of the City, and The Calling.
Table of Contents
- Patmos III
- Patmos V
The Common’s 10 Most-Read Pieces of 2020
January 10, 2021
News and Events
As The Common office gears up to share exciting new works in 2021, we want to reflect on the pieces that made 2020—our 10th anniversary year—an incredibly special one! Below, you can browse our list of 2020’s most-read pieces to see which works of fiction, essays, interviews, and more left an impact on our readers.