Poetry | Page 3 | The Common

If You Are Learning English

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

consider articulation, both speech
and the assembly of a joint,
the cooperation of bones and
marijuana; English: Mary Jane:
shoe, or the talentless friend you
secretly love who is also the pretty,
skirted woman in Spiderman who

Undoing

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

By HUGO DOS SANTOS

Despite the brief streaks of self-
belief, a stubborn defeat pervades.
Absent a job, absent a title.

I want to declare: a great undoing has taken place.
And I don’t know where to search for the bricks
that once made up the house of who I used to be.

In Place of River I’ll Use [God]

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

By EZZA AHMED

Ten days behind my tongue
summer in the diasporic,
riding thick in the smell of [God]
and fresh cloves.

By [God] I mean the monsoon season
where water appeared in snake-like streams
erasing all traces of my
present tense.

My Cousin Thinks I Gave Her Nazr

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

By EZZA AMHED

Because I didn’t say Mashallah when she swapped her nose stud for a hoop and two days later I’m met by the bursting bulb of blood and pus which seals the fibrous innards of her nose cartilage on the outside sits the bulb pulsing expanding as if it’s breathing looks like a red evil eye ornament white pupil right at the center she has a nose growing out of her nose

Deaccessioning

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

By RACHEL HADAS

The old woman with the art
paces through her silent rooms,
sunlight reflecting off the frames.
Adult children live downstairs
in the basement. Whose is the art?
Is it the world’s or hers or theirs?

U N C O N T A I N A B L E

April 24, 2026 Issue 31, Issue 31 Poetry, Poetry

By L. S. KLATT

I leave the house unlocked & walk to the garage jacked to
The White Stripes. My mouth is a guitar; snow is in the sound hole.
Spring. I think it’s spring. The automatic door leaps

in its tracks & is music again. I record on my phone a soundwave
as the GTO convertible wheels out of its tomb, the driveway
chartreuse with maple wings. Tell White I’ll cut some garlic