Commonwealth names both the wealth of a place and the people who partake of that wealth. These poems celebrate the wealth of a place and its members. They are still lifes that focus our attention on the hands and crafts that weave a common life. They bid us marvel at the birds and plants, the makers and their tools, the lives and deaths that sustain its fabric. Dan Rattelle writes as an artisan among artisans in this craftsman’s homage to home.
“These poems are noteworthy for their compact, evocative descriptions, their formal command of both free verse and traditional meters, and the telling insights conveyed by their measured, conversational tone.”
–Robert B. Shaw
“In an age in which we have all but lost the ability to see the extraordinary beauty of ordinary, “deep down things,” it falls to the poet to make the familiar strange so that we may see the world as it truly is. In The Commonwealth, Rattelle does just that. Here the quotidian and monotonous becomes exotic and alluring. In these poems, we are struck with the dearest freshness of everyday life.”
–J. Brandon Meeks, author of The Foolishness of God
“This volumeis aptly titled. These poems engage with human community – bonds of marriage, family, friendship, history – and rituals of labor and leisure that define and nurture a vision of shared human good.”
-Sally Thomas, author of Motherland
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Dan Rattelle