News & Events | Page 299 | The Common | A Modern Sense of Place: Stories, Poems, Essays & Images

Bring ‘Em Home

April 11, 2012 Dispatches

on idyllic Bali in 21stcentury with Frank who keeps talking about Charlie, as we relax in sun-glasses and tee-shirts during our drive across the island, our road traversing numerous picturesque terraced rice paddies, with Frank who periodically rolls down a window of the mini-van to shout “bring ‘em home!” at the oblivious farmers peacefully tending their crops, many of whom are indeed wearing woven grass sun-hats for the heat

Studies

April 9, 2012 Poetry

By AMELIA GRAY

Slush

Not enough snow to stick, Mother says. A pissing thin layer of the saddest slick. Even the road made visible underneath. Used to be you could die in a winter, wander right off the road and dead in a field before you had your second thought, but these days everyone gets to their destination. Have you ever arrived in a springtime with your entire family intact?

“An All But Empty Set”

April 6, 2012 Issue 03, Issue 03 Poetry, Poetry

By BRAD LEITHAUSER

He or she was hard-wired
to calculate

in nanoseconds, light years; to climb
summit to summit above

the squat mud settlements, and oversee
the pyramid poised on pyramid

Five Waterfalls

April 4, 2012 Dispatches

By JAMES A. GILL

The trail never begins level. It’s part of the architecture of a waterfall. A creek or a stream or a river is flowing along its course, and then there is an abrupt change—a fall—that brings the water a little closer to sea level. A little closer to home.

The Review Review (2012)

April 3, 2012 News and Events

The Review Review interviews editor-in-chief Jennifer Acker on “capturing the essence of somewhere particular.”

New York Book Show (2012)

April 3, 2012 News and Events

The 26th Annual New York Book Show recognized The Common Issues 01 and 02, which won a second place literary magazine design award.

The Reluctant Traveler

April 1, 2012 Issue 03, Issue 03 Poetry, Poetry

By RACHEL HADAS

It seems I had to come this far to see
a puppy rooting in a pile of garbage,
scarlet blossoms on a poinsettia tree. 

Swingin in the Attic

April 1, 2012 Issue 03, Issue 03 Poetry, Poetry

By RACHEL HADAS

In Richard’s attic, I
swung on a swing suspended from a rafter
and listened to two fables
read by my host in a voice that sometimes broke. 

A Story with a Crack in It

April 1, 2012 Issue 03, Issue 03 Poetry, Poetry

By DENIS HIRSON

and it all begins

 and it will never cease 

—Mxolisi Nyezwa

This story begins on a lake in the Berkshires, up among the low hills and wild blue turkeys and deep woods, up in the northeast before you get to Canada. There I am with my daughter, pulling a rowing boat out across the sand and onto the weed-thick water.

At the Busy Intersection

April 1, 2012 Issue 03, Issue 03 Poetry, Poetry

By VICTORIA REDEL

When I saw the man tuck the boy
under his arm like a chicken
or a football, it made me
remember how after one week
of pre-season my youngest declared
his body was all wrong,
insufficient to take down boys
he needed taken down