The two tall boys, brothers, both
with wire-rimmed glasses, with wicker
creels, fly-fishing gear, and vests
with patches of sheepskin shearling
dotted with troutflies, worked their way
downstream in their rubber waders.
This is the body, the eight year old body, cream skinned, cat boned, silent.
Call the body Johnny.
Bend the body—it will not break.
Bend forward, Johnny.
Corby, England, 1972
What was so terribly frightening
about the dark wood elephant heads
that hung in my grandfather’s hall,
tusks aligned, trunks slightly upturned
at the end, as if signaling luck—?
By ARAN DONOVAN
wait for me. you have perhaps
been out there and married unsuccessfully
to several ladies. you’ve been maybe
like a feudal lord a little
gluttonous with your helpings, have gulped
By LINDA ASHOK
While you play with your tresses,
and suckle your diamond with trust,
while you play with the bubbles
in your lime-soda with that straw,
there’s something you are trying
to place and I am missing it.
New work by our contributors TINA CANE and TOM PAINE
WORK by Tina Cane
I can’t stop horses as much as you can’t stop horses,”
“Other Horses,” Michael Klein
What is work but a horse is a beast to be one with the broom I bristle
toil tool and trade work is a poem I made is my children is family a broken
The Common brings you a special two-part series as a preview to Tesserae: Poetry of Community – A Reading & Celebration of Immigrants & New Americans, coming up on Sunday, April 22 3:30–5pm at The Parlor Room in Northampton, MA; free admission. You can view Part One of the series here.
Part Two – featuring poems by Tamiko Beyer, Leslie Marie Aguilar, and Oliver de la Paz.
The Common brings you a special two-part series as a preview to Tesserae: Poetry Of Community – A Reading & Celebration Of Immigrants & New Americans, coming up on Sunday, April 22 3:30–5pm at The Parlor Room in Northampton, MA; free admission.
Part One – featuring poems by Kirun Kapur, María Luisa Arroyo, and Ocean Vuong.
In March we welcome three poets new to our pages; all three have work forthcoming in the print journal, as well.
Zero Slave Teeth
On the radio I hear about George Washington’s teeth.
A guest says what do you think his teeth were and a host
says wood. I’ve read about Waterloo teeth, how we prowled
battlefields, plucked teeth from young French corpses,
wired them up to make fresh rich people mouths.
un/bodying/s
Poetry by TODD HEARON
Music by GREGORY W. BROWN
“I have made
an elegy for myself it
is true”
Geoffrey Hill, i.m., 1932 – 2016
1. The Meeting of the Waters
Sempiternal waters, sing-
ly sing, gush glottal-less & all
onomatopoetical your
triphthong’s liquid pluraling
through rock & ruck & rill
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Celebrating 15 Years