Here at The Common, we’re all about place, so we’ve been experimenting with more ways for readers to experience the locations of our pieces. Using this map, you can explore all the dispatches we’ve published set in New York City. Get to know Eli the Seltzer Man, the nighthawks on the Upper West Side, and more!
COURTNEY BUDER
I thought it was wonderful. I remember standing in the middle of the street, the wind tearing straight through me. I watched my red hat get sucked up and away into the grey, watched trees flail, calm as a clam, as a strange and lonely little girl transfixed, like watching a snow globe from the inside.
SHANLEY POOLE
I’m asking for a new geography, / something beyond the spiritual. // Tell me again, about that first / drive up Appalachian slopes // how you knew on sight these hills / could be home. I want // this effervescent temporary, here / with the bob-tailed cat // and a hundred hornet nests.
SARA RYAN
When the whales wash up on shore, my friend grieves. I feel it too, but it feels further away. Deep in me, treading water, legs furiously churning under the surface. The first whale washes up on the oceanfront, just off the boardwalk. People drive out to stare at it. Its dark wet form deflates into the sand.
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