Cleveland

By AVRAM KLINE

 

thday tadashi was driving thcorolla,
four menonites showed up with signs

that said contemporary opinion re
our use of color is mixed, come try

thmeatloaf & in this anabab booth
ye may unto all preach thgospel & eat

this meatloaf among among among,
& tadashi sat in thbooth & admired

thbonneted waitress who said to him
huldrych never saw a beachball

as ye never saw my buggy, now as
snow ye come to me, court me

in my rummy rummy home & bundle
me in quilt as wick goes & mate with me

& bundle me, & tadashi came upon th
pulpit as pastor elm was carrying on re

standing naked before his captors, saying
i come from elms along the cuyahoga,

areola crinkling onthtongue, let us
irrigate, let us make supple this bullock

& all his flesh with his head & his legs
& his inwards & his dung, & burnhimon

the wood, & horace sitting beside
tadashi sitting beside young men beside

men declared amen yah women yah!
& elm went on re thmountain zebra thplains

zebra quagga quagga, zevra ye wild ass,
he warned, we’ll lose our coats in wildfire!

ye hear for skins rattle? & reba sitting among
young women among women stood & from

her throat came huldrych zwingli did ablute!
tadashi put thjug of rootbeer inthtrunk

 

 

Avram Kline lives in Brooklyn and teaches at a public high school in Manhattan. He co-curates Readings at Milk & Roses, a monthly poetry event in Greenpoint.

Click here to purchase Issue 03

From the beginning, The Common has brought you transportive writing and exciting new voices. We are committed to supporting writers and maintaining free, unrestricted access to our website, but we can’t do it without you. Become an integral part of our global community of readers and writers by donating today. No amount is too small. Thank you!

Cleveland

Related Posts

Close-up of a field of rye

April 2026 Poetry Feature #1: Carson Wolfe, Benjamin Paloff, and Jehanne Dubrow

JEHANNE DUBROW
For years, I’ve been drafting a book / about trauma, how words may form / a likeness of the mind that’s torn— / the past tears easily as paper, I write. / And don’t the leaves on the ground / resemble ripped poems, as if the weather / keeps trying to find the right phrase, / all those crumpled revisions of the seasons.

Black and white portrait of a man wearing spectacles.

They Could Have

CONSTANTINE CONTOGENIS
Near destitute, I’m this close to homeless. / This killer of a city, Antioch, / it’s eaten all the money I have, / this killer and its cost of living. // But I’m young, in the best health. / I speak a marvelous Greek / (and I know, I mean “know,” my Aristotle, Plato, / the orators, poets, the—well, you name them).

March 2026 Poetry Feature: Welcome Back Peter Filkins

PETER FILKINS
pissarro is dead cézanne too / swept away like willowed flotsam / that brute degas gone as well / chafing tides the sea of years // long ago battles fought discarded / ballast tossed from fame’s balloon / rising like heat and the unheard prices / feeding straw to the fires of need // for more garden cuttings variants