minuscule & momentous
antonym july 2021
Name Change 21 Orion C. Cadillac Inflorescence 22 Julie Menke & John Whittaker Lemonade 24 Sonia Charales will to live 26 Macy Punzalan Contributors 28
table of contents
Letter from the Editors 5 Sonia Charales, Johanna Monson Geerts, & Caroline Wolfe-Merritt The Implications of Eating Popsicles Before Noon 7 Maria Connors New Routines 8 Orion C. find joy 11 Caroline Wolfe-Merritt adam 12 Johanna Monson Geerts find your pulse 17 Macy Punzalan Pulling Heartstrings 20 Sonia Charales
To all readers, artists, contributors, and creative souls, Salutations! We are thrilled to welcome you to this latest installment of antonym -- our first since becoming a bimonthly publication (more on that below!) As we perused your submissions this month, we were startled at how easily a common theme emerged. Here you will find pieces that encapsulate tiny but significant moments; things at once mundane and extraordinary; a sense of perseverance and awareness. Thank you to all the creators who submitted this month, we are excited to bear witness to the conversations and connections that you find within this little magazine. Since our beginnings in May 2020, we have filled our digital (and print) pages with your reflections, interpretations, musings, and escapes from the ever-changing world around us. You have shared both deep sorrows and moments of joy found amidst a global pandemic, and we have found solace in the community you helped build. Now, as vaccines have become broadly available in the US and many people have returned to friends, work, travels, and in-person goings-ons, it seems apt for antonym to adapt as well. As our busy schedules slowly return, we hope our longer submission periods (now 2 months) will allow for you to continue to share your amazing creative endeavors. Best wishes to you all, Sonia, Johanna, and Caroline
letter from the editors
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Cover “take a seat, come to eat" | John Whittaker antonym logo | Micaela Levesque Digital design software | Lucidpress august-july 2021 Editors | Sonia Charales, Johanna Monson Geerts, & Caroline Wolfe-Merritt
What do orange popsicles taste like when you eat them alone, For breakfast, on your porch at 11am? Sticky fingertips reach out to touch the heat wave, ask it to stay for lunch. Showers take longer, skin dirtied by daily company— I scrub jokes out from behind my ears, comb hyperboles through my hair, I make small talk with the showerhead, and the hot water never runs out. I daydream of a planet where the moon takes up half the sky Always a third face in a two-person conversation (keeping us company, keeping us strangers) I could exchange a knowing look with the stars, should I get too shy. I make room in my body for the ordeal of being known A process, I discover, that involves emptying oneself, hollowing out ligaments And dead tissue to make space for two—we can both fit, if we sleep head-to-foot. At night, I’ll play myself a lullaby—not to fall asleep, but to make sure I stay awake The draft from the window sifts through still air and I draw circles in space with my index finger, linking trains of thought.
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The Implications of Eating Popsicles Before Noon Maria Connors Ma
“Yeah?” “You sucked your teeth and you haven’t typed anything in, like, five minutes?” She groans, calming when I offer her a drink. Luckily, our new kittens had left her alone when she got home. But that just meant the two loveable monsters would be leaping onto the bed to be with us, play, and claw at each other at all hours of the night. An earlier sleep is necessary. She and I grumble, knowing tomorrow will be a tired day. But as I watch her type away, sorting images, and fighting to have the presentation readable, I see her body continuing to find reserves of energy where mine would have collapsed. She flawlessly endures the new trials of home work as well as in-person teaching. I had tried to mimic her strength, change up my routine, but found my assumptions correct. I had taken an overnight job, physically demanding, 55-60 hour weeks, six days a week to pay for this new job in this new country. I barely survived, yet she somehow does more with less. Her teaching hours could sometimes be just as long, but not as often now since the move to Korea. When it does happen here, like tonight, it’s a KSA (Korean Surprise Attack). The surprise would have driven me into a fit, though not as much as before I met her. Yet she rolls with the punches, delving right into how the problem can be addressed, where I would have at least needed a moment to seethe. She turns to me, informing me that she’s “Almost done.” I have no real reply to that beyond a scoff and a repetition of a tired joke we always share with mock enthusiasm. “Open PowerPoint. Click… Click… Click… And it’s midnight!” We have our chuckle, and return to our activities. Luckily, after a year in Korea, the joke is a relic, made obsolete by her practice. The presentation is complete only a half hour after our bedtime. It’s primed to be used and ignored by the students. She stands and begins her own bedtime routine, giving the kittens a plethora of kisses as they wake to practice their hunting skills. The pudgy cuddle bug soaks up the admiration while the lithe jock accepts a single pat before continuing. With no other possible distractions, she focuses on what all she has to do before as best a night as we can get now.
As she whittles away at her work, the computer screen blaring its obnoxious white light into our red lit sanctuary, I casually, yet firmly say to my wife, “tap tap tap”, like her computer could change its color filter setting so easily. She sighs, resisting the urge to rattle her cornrows, resigned to the action she regrettably forgot, and begrudgingly holding back the chastisements for ‘micromanaging’ her. Despite my tone, she acknowledges I was only reminding her of what will help us sleep. With a suck of her teeth, she advances her PowerPoint presentation, and longs to join me as I sit on the bed. Day in and day out, she departs on her routine for the English teaching job in Korea we both earned and both deserve. Returning hours later, her mind races for things to do and improve the apartment’s two tiny rooms. Somehow, a kitchen, bedroom, living area, and storage have to fit in what could be considered a dorm. We’ve tamed the chaos, but suitcases make for poor dressers. It weighs on us both, needing to be fixed, but work has followed her today. She kept it secret until an hour before we would sleep. It’s understandable; after being at work for nine hours, anyone would need a break, especially after having to be active all day for the children learning another language. Regardless, she can see my annoyance. She rolls her eyes, made more piercing by the colored contacts, at what should be as second nature for me as it is for her. My sleep routine was, and continues to be, important, but there are always times one must adapt to fit the situation. “Don’t you say ‘be water, my friend’?”, she would always mock me back in America when I complained that I would be getting less rest. “Yeah, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to get to sleep on time!” I would then reply, which then became “that doesn’t mean I can’t be annoyed about it” which has now morphed into silently enduring the annoyance. Despite what an infrequent sleeping schedule can do to one’s health, she never let that stop her. Again, she sucks her teeth. “Not like he has arthritis and needs the sleep. Well done, you’re a wonderful wife.” “Are you okay?” I lean over her solidly tense shoulder.
New Routines Orion C. Ma
The computer closes with a tepid thunk to mark the day complete and I put it away, tidy up the only table, which was her workstation tonight, along with the other facets of the room that need changing before sleep can come. With the kittens, more has to be done, like putting away their toys or checking their food bowls, but an audiobook keeps the annoyance at bay. Regardless, the new routines we have formed serve as well as they can, providing us with enough sleep to deal with tomorrow’s annoyances. I construct a mental list of what must be done when we wake, forcing myself to melt and fill her mold.
find joy Caroline Wolfe-Merritt
adam Johanna Monson Geerts
i'm staring at my palm, the notification, but first the date; it's april and i'm not sure how it can be april. and then the notification, the text that reads: his name is adam and it's a date. i don't know anyone named adam. i never agreed to a date with anyone. the man that i play with every new year's. his name... is his name adam? what is his name, i can't remember. it's not new year's and i can't remember his name, what color is his sweater? is his hair brown, is it pulled back out of his face, are his jeans rough and blue? the pads of my three middle fingers could touch his cheek and feel the sunshine, feel the wind. i know they could because i've felt it in the past. haven't i? have i ever stretched out my hand with the pads of my three middle fingers pressed into his cheek, have i ever touched him? his eyes. his eyes are green. no. wait. no. blue? sift through my memories like watching the sand trickle through an hourglass; where is the farm? it's the kind of place that's branded into my eyelids when i close my eyes, tan dirt road, endless blue sky, i'm sure i'll find my way there, sure it's out there somewhere, is it out there somewhere? surely the picnic tables can't only exist in my mind. but i can't remember where they are, the picnic tables, the rusty silos, the trees that are evenly spaced and perfect like a drawing.
i tell him that i'll see him on new year's, new year's is the day we play. i don't know when it started, don't know how long it's been going on. once a year, just once. new year's. the picnic tables are where i meet him. year after year, at the picnic tables on the farm. the picnic tables beneath the pair of rusted, white silos, i'll wear my yellow rubber boots, they'll crunch the tan dirt road and i'll count each of the evenly spaced trees and then he'll be there. new year's is when i'll meet him there, new year's is when we play. new year's is when i'll see him again. like i could ever forget what he looks like. rough blue jeans, thick brown sweater with the cables running up and down his chest, and the kind of skin that i know would feel like midday sun and cold spring winds if i were to touch it. brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, his eyes will catch me off guard. green eyes. green like spring. it's spring now. it's spring now? i can't remember picking up my phone but it must have buzzed in my hand because i'm staring at my palm, the notification, but first the date; it's april and i'm not sure how it can be april. and then the notification, the text that reads: his name is adam and it's a date. i don't know anyone named adam. i never agreed to a date with anyone.
over my chest and every man i pass on the sidewalk wears rough, blue jeans, i hit the buttons on the remote and in every scene the characters say adam. adam. adam. check my phone every day and it's april. april, april, april. the days change but the month never does. new year's never gets closer. i wonder if any of this is real, i wonder if i'm living in a hallucination. but now i feel it, i feel my phone buzz and there's a text on the screen, the screen says: his name is adam and it's a date. the same message. the same one as before but this time i read the date and it's new year's. reach around to slip the phone into my bag but there's just air, i spin, searching, where is my bag? see the tan dirt road under my feet, under the feet that are now wearing yellow rubber boots. look up at the huge blue sky, the sun peeking out from behind the pair of rusted white silos, with my eyes i follow the line of trees that are evenly spaced and perfect, like a drawing, down the road and there's a man. crunch is the sound his shoes make on the tan dirt road, i can see him, he's wearing slim, dark jeans, a black t-shirt and a plaid flannel shirt draped across his shoulders, checks in maroon and navy blue and white. i don't know where the past eight months went; it's new year's. and it was just april, how is it new year's? how am i here? if it's new year's and i'm here at the picnic tables and he's here then he must be the man that i meet every year, every new year's. adam?
and it's spring, it's still months until new year's, still months and months until i can see him again, this man that i can't remember. and then there's the text, the date, i have my doubts on who adam is, could he be the man i meet every new year's? i can't meet adam. if i meet adam and he is the man i meet at the picnic tables i will be breaking tradition, i will be meeting him twice in a year. and if he's not the man that i meet each year, each new year's, at the picnic tables? i still have my doubts about who adam is. and i still can't remember last new year's or the new year's before that or the one before that either. my memory is too hazy to remember new year's for the past 3 years. i'm starting to think i never felt my yellow rainboots crunching that tan dirt road, never felt the cheek that's an entire year's worth of seasons in one patch of skin, i must be going insane; i can't remember anything. i'm starting to think he's not real. then i see him. i'm at the grocery store, plastic basket dragging my right arm closer and closer to the floor and bruising my thigh with each bump and i see him. there he is at the register with his brown sweater and his sleek brown ponytail, there he is crossing the road in front of me, my foot slams the brake and he turns and our eyes meet. his green eyes. i'm walking down the street, arms wrapped around my body, holding my jacket closed over my chest and every man i pass on the sidewalk wears rough, blue jeans, i hit the buttons on the remote and in every scene the characters say adam. adam. adam.
With my ear pressed up against my pillow, I listened to her. It’s only on these nights that I ever do. Days are busy and I often forget to find comfort in her soft cadence. All too often, I forget the essence of being, the significance and the magnitude, the vitality, and the privilege that falls with existence. I often fall into a mundane demeanor, a dreary perspective, that gives rise to the hum and the drum of life but not the true tune to which it runs of. In the dark of the night, she reminds. It is then that she can no longer shun the seductive sultry lime-light. This moment she is given, is her God given moment to be made known to every man in the quiet of the night without being consciously searched for by stained hands and cold presses of silver. let her have it, she already has. It is in her tacit nature that empowers the hammer she strikes as the tricuspid and the mitral valves simultaneously slam for a pithy second or two. This is her transient moment to humble not herself behind those closed doors, but the being she was encapsulated within.
find your pulse Macy Punzalan
that i meet every year, every new year's. adam? he's coming closer to me, here in this place that is the most real place i've ever been and he's different than i remember him but my mind is so hazy, maybe i remembered him wrong all this time. he looks at me and he says, i'm adam. and then he's in front of me and i can see that his hair is shorter, brown, no ponytail, his hair falls into his eyes. blue eyes.
Intrigued by her acute tantrum, in the dark I heard; and I felt; and I allowed my fear to accentuate her. She was the tiny thud in my wrist, the pitter patter in my skull, the cry that resonated from my chest, the rhythm I felt all over. She was the throb that came with the Pain and the flutter that soared with Euphoria. She was forever oscillating around her thesis that she and I were two and one and truly alive all at once. I could not be without her and she without me… Together, we were so very, very much alive leaving me both frightened and in awe.
and cold presses of silver. let her have it, she already has. It is in her tacit nature that empowers the hammer she strikes as the tricuspid and the mitral valves simultaneously slam for a pithy second or two. This is her transient moment to humble not herself behind those closed doors, but the being she was encapsulated within. I could feel her. She was not the shiver down my spinal column, no, that was fear. My body felt her all over, pulsating through my skin. She wanted to be felt, to be held by fear. Her reverberation rapidly evolved into a drum, steady and sure of her debut. Silence muted for her and my body slacked against her fight. Her fragility augmented trepidation and from every space within, I felt her run through the course of my veins animating the inner workings of me.
My name was never mine. Our tags are rarely possessed. When we enter the world in our own way We cannot make the choice. Our label is stamped. Stockholm syndrome claims some And others embrace their mold. I feel it. Spasms wrack me, consume me, dissipate While rage fuels prickles on my head. I am called, I must answer, I must escape. Any humane prison has a window Through which we may see future freedom. All art portrays them angled up To the stars. Mine showed the giant and his belt. Looking down, through his opening in the trees, Trapped by the capricious whims of the gods, He observed my plight, a hunter pitying a chained animal. I struggled to see beyond the canopy That parted to show me. The wild and untamed Wilderness allowing my chain the slack of freedom, And tangling me if I strayed too far. He saw me struggle Blind as my foraging kept me within the chain’s breadth Unable to find a way to break it. When victory came, a new life started, a new label, I chose my own, for the man who presided over me, Orion.
Name Change Orion C.
Pulling Heartstrings Sonia Charales
Cadillac Inflorescence John Whittaker
Cadillac Inflorescence Julie Menke
When I was a child, I always wanted to smell the scent of the flowers As how I saw poets describe it. But to me they were odorless, lifeless in aroma; Perhaps my sense of smell wasn’t working, I thought. But I found this to be true for not just the flowers, And not just my sense of smell. Years passed, and with it came change. Change of heart, of point of view, of how to live life. Grey is thought to be a dull color, But with this change it became the most vivid. Dancing in the grey allows for seeing the intricacies That require a longer look. Cacti are thought to be thorny and bare, But they tend to show their flowers To those who care to look.
The sweet tang of lemonade slid down her throat. The taste reminded her of the lemon drops she ate as a child. Cool droplets of water dripped down the glass to her hands. As she closes her eyes, she thinks of summer. Sitting on the shore by the sea. The warm sand beneath her feet as the wind waltzed with the sea salt air. The sea cooed at her with an invitation to join it. Her eyes open to the sound of her laptop. A new email for her. She looks down at the glass of lemonade and smiles. “It can wait until morning.” She closes her laptop and sits down to finish the drink. At the end of the day, she can still make a fine glass of lemonade. A moment to enjoy for herself.
Lemonade Sonia Charales
Esther stared at her laptop, and the blue light gazed right back at her. The bags under her eyes drooped as her fingers rigorously typed on the keyboard. Thoughts of her agenda swirled in her mind like a blender. The deadline for her project approached as the clock continued to tick. Pressure wrapped around her forehead, and her shoulders tightened up. If it was not completed by tonight, she knew she was going to hear it in the morning. “When I was your age, I was able to complete projects like this in no time. How incompetent are you? This is what happens when we put a younger person in charge. We are seen as a joke, and it is all your fault!” The scolding words of her supervisor bounced around her head like a ping pong ball. Her ring finger hit “enter”, then she closed her laptop. It was finished and out of her hands. She leaned back in her rolling chair and tilted her head back. She closed her eyes, removed her glasses, and rubbed the bags under her eyes. Deep breaths traveled in and out of her. Every exhale relieved the pressure, but her headache continued to grow as she glanced at her calendar. Months have passed since she applied for that job. A job among the scholars she looked up to. Her way to finally gain some respect and have her hard work pay off. All she wants is to be just like one of them. However, rejection felt inevitable for her. Stress pulsed through her temples like jolts of electricity. She sighed and spun out of her chair. The kitchen lights flicked on. Whenever Esther experienced a drought of motivation, she replenished her soul by making something. In this case, a treat for herself. Her slightly numb fingers reached for the nearest clean glass and filled it with a handful of chunky, pale ice. She pulled a mason jar of sugar from the pantry and grabbed some lemon juice and sparkling water from the fridge. Her hands grasped onto the yellow cap of the curvy green bottle of lemon juice. Once the cap was twisted off, the melting ice welcomed the sour juice. The blue bottle of sparkling water hissed open and joined the cold, sour mingle. It bubbled to the rim of the glass, yet not a single drop spilled over. With a silver spoon, four heaps of white sugar were dusted into the drink. Bubbles fizzed to the top of the glass as if to greet Esther with glee. She smiled at her simple accomplishment.
will to live Macy Punzalan
Rest your head along the gentle stream as weary branches dangle and toss lost lilacs in the light breeze. Your sighs will drift inaudibly in welcoming waters scraping against coarse rocks. You would think this bridge was built to carry the weight of the world, but you feel it crumble just as you do. Air out your lungs, not on the pavement, but on the porch. When we gathered it was over freedom, but now you sit unaccompanied over idle waters. The sigh is not yours alone. Have you found your loss? I heard it softly bubble up in the rushing waters, pooling into crevices we can never follow. A glimpse of could haves, of what was, I hope we find it and let it go.
orion c. is just himself, hoping you can work on your dreams today.
julie menke is a fifth year at Earlham College studying Psychology and Biology, and is of a Jewish and Peruvian background. Studying both Psychology and Biology with a focus of fungi at Earlham College, she also enjoys an amalgam of hobbies such as swimming, language learning, cooking, powerlifting, and tennis. She is currently studying Quechua in her free time.
maria connors is a writer of primarily of poetry and plays, currently based in Central Massachusetts. Lover of breezy summer nights, mint chocolate-chip ice cream, and The Bachelor franchise.
contributors.
john whittaker is a photographer and junior at Earlham College. In between editing photos and completing school assignments, John sings, runs, kayaks, swims, studies languages, and reads. He has contributed images to various photobooks and magazines in both Bolivia and the United States. He loves photographing for magazines, documentaries, websites, billboards, and everything in between. He is currently studying Quechua in his free time.
macy punzalan is currently a Doctor or Dental Medicine Candidate at the University of New England. She loves to write poems, paint, and play piano. She has previously published "The Anatomy of Him" in the Tunnel online literary arts magazine, "Before the Whole World Wakes Up" in the Straylight Literary Arts Magazine, and "Proprioception" in the Overachiever Magazine.
sonia charales is an ambitious individual who finds expression through art and writing.
caroline wolfe-merritt enjoys spending as much time outside as possible, whether taking photos, birding, running, looking for salamanders, or following the (curious) lead of her inner child.
johanna monson geerts is a maker, writer, and explorer currently living in Richmond, VA. She believes in the power of quiet work and ordinary stories. You can find her artwork and more of her poems on Instagram @spacenohyphen