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The Common

@commonmag.bsky.social

1.2K followers 820 following 450 posts

The Common is a print and online literary magazine publishing stories, essays, poetry, and art with a modern sense of place. Based at Amherst College, we highlight writers and work from around the world.

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The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 14h

"I found myself clinging to my lifelong impressions, stuffing my hands into pockets of remembrances."

Ben Tamburri explores the conflict between nostalgia and reality during a return to a childhood vacation spot in his dispatch, "On the Shores of Baileys Harbor." Read it below!

On the Shores of Baileys Harbor

BEN TAMBURRI <br> The beaches of Baileys Harbor are for birds, too pebbly and coarse to relax on. The water is cold, and the waves break at your ankles.

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 18h

"Water became a tamed thing that dwelled // in ascribed spaces: ponds, ravines, drought’s interstices, / its worn out stitching."

Liza Katz Duncan's new Dispatch from the Jersey Shore bathes in the whirlpool meeting of wildlife and culture. Dive in below!

"During the Drought," "Sestina, Mount Mitchill," "Dragonflies"

LIZA KATZ DUNCAN <br> "My love, think / of the dragonflies, each migratory trip / spanning generations."

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 18h

Loved "The History of Sound" (2025)? Check out this Boston Globe article about how Ben Shattuck's story got it's start... as a piece in The Common!

Read the article: buff.ly/Zxz7qBo

Read the original piece: buff.ly/oXVF2iu

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 1d

10/18! Farmworker Portfolio @Litquake in the San Fransisco Botanical Gardens.

Join Issue 26 contributors Nora Rodriguez & Amanda Mei Kim + Jaime Cortez for a celebration of writing and art from the seasonal, migrant, and immigrant farmworkers behind California's agriculture.

buff.ly/Gc1OOdl

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 1d

On October 25th, hear translators Julia Sanches, Jennifer Jean, and Sekyo Haines in conversation with Jennifer Acker at the Boston Book Festival. These talented writers will reflect on the art of translation and its ability to bridge cultures at this free event!

Find more info at buff.ly/eug7UDF!

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 2d

"We’re holding to the terms by which we leased / our righteousness (and watch it fade and fall apart)."

Nathaniel Perry questions the way we distance ourselves from injustice in his new recording of his poem, 37 (Song, with People on the Street). Listen below!

37 (Song, with People on the Street)

NATHANIEL PERRY <br> I know you think that evil always fades / like grass, that even when it spreads itself / like a bay tree, or cobwebs on a shelf, / time will turn it back, as sun with shade, / or…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 2d

10/18! Farmworker Portfolio @Litquake in the San Fransisco Botanical Gardens.

Join Issue 26 contributors Nora Rodriguez & Amanda Mei Kim + Jaime Cortez for a celebration of writing and art from the seasonal, migrant, and immigrant farmworkers behind California's agriculture.

buff.ly/Gc1OOdl

Litquake 2025: Our Farmworking Hands Helped Harvest the...

View more about this event at Litquake 2025

litquake2025.sched.com

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 4d

Stop by the Boston Book Festival on 10/25 for our free panel discussion with translators Julia Sanches, Jennifer Jean, and Sekyo Haines! Moderated by TC editor-in-chief Jennifer Acker, these writers will discuss how translation can expand our sense of place.

Find more info at buff.ly/eug7UDF!

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 6d

"She hates forming meatballs in her hands, digging in the sticky mass again and again. They pull the awful lump from between her legs. "

"Knives, Tongues ," by Simoné Goldschmidt-Lechner.
Translated from the German by Melody Makeda Ledwon.
buff.ly/NFuasy8

Knives, Tongues

SIMONÉ GOLDSCHMIDT-LECHNER <br> The paths are drawn on the ground before the borders appear. We buried water and supplies there, made this barren ground walkable, and moved from the north to the…

www.thecommononline.org

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 6d

"Would this mean we are listening / to the same song / everywhere / all the time?"

Lisa Asagi submerges into dark and resonant waters with her poems and whale sculptures in this month's poetry feature. Explore the depths on our website!

buff.ly/uPRTr1X

September 2025 Poetry Feature: Earth Water Fire Poems, a Conversation

LISA ASAGI <br> "No one knows why / water becomes rain / only the how / and maybe the where"

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 7d

"I had carried the weight of dependency for so long, yet I felt its absence not as the lifting of a burden but as the carving of a cavity"

Ben Tamburri explores loneliness and comfort during a return to a familiar Wisconsin town. Check out his dispatch below!

On the Shores of Baileys Harbor

BEN TAMBURRI <br> The beaches of Baileys Harbor are for birds, too pebbly and coarse to relax on. The water is cold, and the waves break at your ankles.

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 7d

"The gods must have been giant children squeezing drip sandcastles from their palms, back when this land was at the edge of a sea."

Read Eli Rodriguez Fielder's "The Garden of the Gods" on The Common now:

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 9d

"I know you think that evil always fades / like grass"

In 37 (Song, with People on the Street), Nathaniel Perry questions our self-righteousness in the face of injustice. Check out his new recording of his poem below!

37 (Song, with People on the Street)

NATHANIEL PERRY <br> I know you think that evil always fades / like grass, that even when it spreads itself / like a bay tree, or cobwebs on a shelf, / time will turn it back, as sun with shade, / or…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 13d

"Those incredibly long notes / bending far back into silence."

Delve into the waters of this month's poetry feature! Lisa Asagi explores whales and whale-calls in this collection of poems and sculptures. Click the link below!

buff.ly/uPRTr1X

September 2025 Poetry Feature: Earth Water Fire Poems, a Conversation

LISA ASAGI <br> "No one knows why / water becomes rain / only the how / and maybe the where"

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 14d

"Why don’t they love? Why don’t they care? Those are not real people at my table, the child finally decides. Those are creepers."

Phoebe Hyde examines what responsibilities we have to the people we read about or watch on screens in her new story, "Raspberries." Check it out below!

buff.ly/FqWl80x

PHOEBE HYDE <br> You say you stepped over my trip line of a story by accident? You were just scanning the shelves or pages or screen for a little something light and didn’t think you’d be rattled by…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 14d

In "The Garden of the Gods," Eli Rodriguez Fielder takes a trip through the heart of the Midwest, navigating parenting, road trip mishaps, and the tension of being queer family in the current political climate.

Read our latest dispatch now: buff.ly/JVaUlHF

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 15d

"Loss upon loss settling / Under a lattice of ice."

As winter draws closer, listen to Phillis Levin read his short-but-sweet "December Tanka" poem published in Issue 29. Now on our website!

PHILLIS LEVIN <br> Light snow, bare branches. / It’s easier now to see / Deep into the woods, / Loss upon loss settling / Under a lattice of ice. /

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 20d

"In his eyes I had become the unicorn he had so sought to produce: someone who had, in the most acceptable terms, separated himself from our family’s dysfunction"

Jim Shepard's new poetic essay "The Acrobat" vaults between a love of literature and family history. Read now!

The Reading Life: The Acrobat

JIM SHEPARD <br> And Shep looked only a little chagrined, like someone had asked why he had never become an acrobat, and allowed as how he was sure it was very impressive, given how many…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 21d

"It was easier for me to pretend you were just 'abroad,' as you often were, 'in Syria,' in some distant elsewhere, and not dying a few streets away"

Aya Labnieh's "Damascene Dream" searches for a phone line with the dead.

buff.ly/owzcJN4

Damascene Dream

You raised me, tayteh, rocking me in your lap, spooning Quranic verses into my little ears, scrubbing the living daylights out of me in the bathtub. Slapping your thighs, “Ta’a, ta’a, ta’a,” you’d…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 21d

"You say you just stumbled on my story like a tripwire? And you didn't mean to be here at all?"

Phoebe Hyde's metafictional piece, "Raspberries," draws readers into an especially dark and intimate common: a kitchen, a yard, a basement in someone else's wartime. Check it out below!

PHOEBE HYDE <br> You say you stepped over my trip line of a story by accident? You were just scanning the shelves or pages or screen for a little something light and didn’t think you’d be rattled by…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 22d

"It’s easier now to see / deep into the woods"

On our website, Phillis Levin's gentle "December Tanka" poem published in Issue 29 now features a recording by the author. Give it a listen, and let the chill of December wash over you in these hotter days.

PHILLIS LEVIN <br> Light snow, bare branches. / It’s easier now to see / Deep into the woods, / Loss upon loss settling / Under a lattice of ice. /

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 26d

Find The Common @ the Brooklyn Book Festival next Friday!

Join us at Books Are Magic for a panel discussion / book signing with Emily Everett, Ananda Lima, Annell, López, & Olivia Wolfgang-Smith.

📍122 Montague Street, Brooklyn.
🕖 7PM
This event is free and open to the public.

Official Brooklyn Book Festival BookEnd Event: 15 Years of The Common w/ Emily Everett, Ananda Lima, Annell López, & Olivia Wolfgang-Smith | Books Are Magic

Your Favorite Indie Bookstore!

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 27d

"Visitors passing through on the way to the living room might exclaim 'Who’s reading The History of Lycanthropy? Or All About Tornadoes?'"

Jim Shepard's essay "The Acrobat" details a childhood with books, and a father's desire to reconnect. Read from our Reading Life series now!

The Reading Life: The Acrobat

JIM SHEPARD <br> And Shep looked only a little chagrined, like someone had asked why he had never become an acrobat, and allowed as how he was sure it was very impressive, given how many…

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 27d

"Everything would be colored by irreversibility from this moment on."

During a journey to a waterfall, a man undergoes a rebirth of violence and clarity. Check out Daniela Alcívar Bellolio's short story, translated by Jack Rockwell.

River Landscape

By DANIELA ALCÍVAR BELLOLIO Translated from the Spanish by JACK ROCKWELL

The Common @commonmag.bsky.social · 28d

“'Come, come, come,' and they’d fly, all three of them, out their cages in a flurry and land on your breasts, climb your gold chains, nestle against your cheeks."

Aya Labnieh's dream-dispatch between Anaheim, CA, and Damscus, Syria, revisits the loss of an "Ur-Mother."

Damascene Dream

You raised me, tayteh, rocking me in your lap, spooning Quranic verses into my little ears, scrubbing the living daylights out of me in the bathtub. Slapping your thighs, “Ta’a, ta’a, ta’a,” you’d…