Jennifer Acker's Blog, page 122
January 22, 2019
Review: Emblems of the Passing World: Poems After Photographs by August Sander
LAURA MARRIS
Stoic faces, stiff poses, graceful envelope rhyme—this book is built on the difference between a caption and a title, between identifying an image and re-animating it.
Stoic faces, stiff poses, graceful envelope rhyme—this book is built on the difference between a caption and a title, between identifying an image and re-animating it.
Before Vaudeville was the Next Big Thing
MARC VINCENZ
So—in they slot and plop in their perfectly/ burnished 180-calorie-sandwiched-glory:/ a delectable mélange well-clothed in filigrees/ of dietary fibers, sodium, zero trans fat/ and generously acidic to keep the heebie-jeebies at bay/
So—in they slot and plop in their perfectly/ burnished 180-calorie-sandwiched-glory:/ a delectable mélange well-clothed in filigrees/ of dietary fibers, sodium, zero trans fat/ and generously acidic to keep the heebie-jeebies at bay/
January 18, 2019
Spritehood
ANDREW SHADE
The strong terrorized the weak, not just once but repeatedly, hounding them through one life after another. Normal people became outright thugs, enacting fantasies of domination. Dominated people had a tendency to become informal police, enacting fantasies of justice. Every so often a server crash would plunge everyone weeks into the past, to the most recent backup.
The strong terrorized the weak, not just once but repeatedly, hounding them through one life after another. Normal people became outright thugs, enacting fantasies of domination. Dominated people had a tendency to become informal police, enacting fantasies of justice. Every so often a server crash would plunge everyone weeks into the past, to the most recent backup.
Santa Anita
SEAN BERNARD
Living with Ricky is fine. The things you accept—they're small things. Like the way he kicks off his shoes in the hallway at the end of the workday, leaving them there for you to nearly break your ankle on when you have to pee in the middle of the night.
Living with Ricky is fine. The things you accept—they're small things. Like the way he kicks off his shoes in the hallway at the end of the workday, leaving them there for you to nearly break your ankle on when you have to pee in the middle of the night.
The Common’s 10 Most-Read Pieces of 2018
It seems like a great time to reflect on the pieces that made 2018 an exciting time for us! See what resonated with readers the most in 2018 by browsing the list below to survey our most-read works of the past year: they range from fiction to essays, interviews, and more.
January 16, 2019
Ann Arbor Diptych
AVERY FARMER
Everybody stops to watch them battle for the ball. When it spills free, the first man gains control and rolls it across an invisible line between two heaps of t-shirts. Half the players cry in ecstasy. Half sigh in frustration. For a few seconds before this, nobody breathed at all.
Everybody stops to watch them battle for the ball. When it spills free, the first man gains control and rolls it across an invisible line between two heaps of t-shirts. Half the players cry in ecstasy. Half sigh in frustration. For a few seconds before this, nobody breathed at all.
January 14, 2019
Intuitive Nonfiction: An Interview with Courtney Kersten
COURTNEY KERSTEN
I’ve become much more familiar with sitting with a sentence or a passage and working until it becomes clear. But, like engaging in divination, I feel that writing is always a process of growth and self-awareness, trial-and-error, and experimentation. I’m just on the journey and trying to become more comfortable being a work-in-progress as a human and writer.
I’ve become much more familiar with sitting with a sentence or a passage and working until it becomes clear. But, like engaging in divination, I feel that writing is always a process of growth and self-awareness, trial-and-error, and experimentation. I’m just on the journey and trying to become more comfortable being a work-in-progress as a human and writer.
January 2, 2019
Cirque of Dreams
LINDA KEYES
A cirque of the highest mountains in the world surrounded me. The Modi Khola river whooshed and roared below, tumbling onward.
A cirque of the highest mountains in the world surrounded me. The Modi Khola river whooshed and roared below, tumbling onward.
December 28, 2018
December 2018 Poetry Feature
The long curtain opens and I follow.
I lose myself in the exacting rain. / It trickles down scarred blocks of stone. / The church a storage facility for arms. / Sun sears the graffiti.
I lose myself in the exacting rain. / It trickles down scarred blocks of stone. / The church a storage facility for arms. / Sun sears the graffiti.
December 22, 2018
Keeping Perspective: An Interview with Jeff Holmes
JEFF HOLMES
Hip hop was the soundtrack to the lives of me and my friends. So for that not to be present in the stories, it would have been a great injustice.
Hip hop was the soundtrack to the lives of me and my friends. So for that not to be present in the stories, it would have been a great injustice.
