Volume 23, issue 2

Fall/Winter 2022

At Common Ground Review, we seek to publish well crafted poems, short stories and creative nonfiction that surprises and illuminates, amuses, informs, and challenges. CGR comes out twice a year: we accept submissions from September to May. Our annual poetry contest opens to entries in January and closes mid-April.

Common Ground Review is a free access online publication and a member of CLMP.

Author Pic Garden

We are thrilled to announce that our 2023 Poetry Contest Judge will be Oliver de la Paz.

Oliver de la Paz is the Poet Laureate of Worcester, Massachusetts, for 2023-2025. He is the author and editor of seven books: Names Above Houses, Furious Lullaby, Requiem for the Orchard, Post Subject: A Fable, and The Boy in the Labyrinth, a finalist for the Massachusetts Book Award in Poetry. His newest work, The Diaspora Sonnets, is forthcoming from Liveright Press in 2023.

With Stacey Lynn Brown, he co-edited A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poetry.

A founding member, Oliver serves as the cochair of the Kundiman advisory board. He has received grants from the NEA, NYFA, the Artist’s Trust, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and has been awarded multiple Pushcart Prizes. He teaches at the College of the Holy Cross and in the Low-Residency MFA Program at PLU.

(Photo credit: Meredith Pugh)

Issue Archives

Common Ground Review was founded in 1999 by the Common Ground Writers’ Group, in order to create a place open to many styles of poetry and many different poets. In 2006, CGR affiliated with Western New England College (now Western New England University). After 15 issues, the founding editors turned over the magazine to the current editor in 2011.

Common Ground Review was a print magazine until 2020: copies of many of those issues are available. Please contact us if you're interested in purchasing one or more.