antonym november 2020
remnants & collectives
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table of contents
letter from the editors 5 Anna Barrett, Johanna Monson Geerts, Caroline Wolfe-Merritt Tangled 7 Ellie Hasenberg Spiraling Down 8 Anna Barrett new guitar straps 9 Johanna Monson Geerts Closed window 11 Afia Faiza Shopno Dignity 12 Shelby Kienzle-Pappalardo Hospital 13 Ellie Hasenberg The Little Things 14 Anna Barrett Falling Leaves 17 Alexandra Neckopulos The Storm 18 Ellie Hasenberg Letters for Angelina 19 Caroline Wolfe-Merritt uncommon collage 20 Johanna Monson Geerts Wide Pumpkin 22 Alexandra Neckopulos the other side 23 Johanna Monson Geerts Falling Water 25 Anna Barrett Blue Jay 26 Ellie Hasenberg Contributors 28
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Cover “Process of Bees" | Alexandra Neckopulos antonym logo | Micaela Levesque Digital design software | Lucidpress November Editors | Anna Barrett, Johanna Monson Geerts, & Caroline Wolfe-Merritt
Dear Readers and Creators,
 As with much of 2020, November has been a tumultuous month. Wildfires, hurricanes, weeks of election anxiety, and the rising global toll of the covid-19 pandemic have frayed our nerves. Yet in a time that has left many of us isolated, ruminating on the past and anxiously wondering what will come next, we were pleasantly surprised by the plenitude of your submissions this month. Though the challenges you face were clear for us to see, we felt your perseverance as well. Thus, we invite you to consider how our two themes, Remnants & Collectives, pertain to the pieces you are about to encounter, as well as how they may correspond to your own lives.
 In our first ever letter from the editors (in our May 2020 issue), we shared with you our hope that antonym would grow into an intentional space to share creativity, connect with one another, and respond to chaos in the world. Since then, our editorial team has watched as our community blossomed and that hope became a reality. Today our supporters can be found across the US and in at least 13 countries: a collection of individuals who come from so many distinct life experiences, yet all share a passion for creative expression. We are humbled to see antonym at the center of this diverse community, a community that would not exist without you. Thank you to our readers, followers, subscribers, contributors and supporters. Thank you to those of you who share your reflections, dreams, and creations. Thank you to those of you who step out of your comfort zone, and those of you who keep coming back to antonym. Thank you to those of you who build our community by sharing antonym with friends, and to those who supported our merchandise campaign as we aspired to strengthen our little magazine into something more. Thank you all. Our hearts are filled with gratitude.
 As we continue on towards the end of the year, we encourage you to persist. To find joy in the little things. To seek out hope, compassion, and creativity. And, perhaps most importantly, to keep writing, making, and transforming your vision into something tangible. If you create pieces you’d like to share, please consider coming to one of our antonym workshops or submitting to our December issue, the last issue of 2020. Your talent, imagination, and expression is a light for us all.
 All our best,
 Anna Barrett, Johanna Monson Geerts, & Caroline Wolfe-Merritt November Editors | antonym

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letter from the editors
A piece of rope lay on the grass below me tangled up in every which way. All I could do was lay my fingers upon it, and start twisting and pulling, so that one day, I would know what caused all the knots and then be able to untie them. -YOU
Tangled
Ellie Hasenberg
Spiraling Down
last night i drowned in a sea of cardboard boxes overflowing stuff, like gushing springs. i washed up on the shores of Lake Superior, along the jagged, frozen beaches i turned to ice. snowbanks report to work, begin a job of turning two lane roads into one way streets. a tangled mental map unfolds, guiding a rusty red car, slowly, atop the slush; perhaps the avenues still remember my name. memories of rough clay bowls filled with creamy risotto become photographs of the blue shadows cast upon snow, desiccated golden flowers still lovely in the chill; golden honey drips from a peanut butter sandwich eaten upon a hearth. x marks the spot of a shallow scab on my wrist, and a town sixteen hundred miles away where i'll migrate to and hope that because the monarchs like the southwest i, too, will love the desert. the earth offers up to me the sun swathed in turquoise sky and i try to be happy, but being thankful is hard. i settle for the comfort of curved wood and six strings, fingertips becoming rough, while the snow cradles a spotted brown egg.

Anna Barrett
Johanna Monson Geerts
new guitar straps
Closed window
Afia Faiza Shopno
The moonlight directs his attention to the torso of the being beneath him. A #10 blade is placed on her beating chest, the blade glides from between her collar bones to a few inches above her belly button. Red beads follow the incision, causing a river like the Nile to flow down her figure. The skin on the sides of the river is held back, and a layer of tissue is exposed. The blade returns, making another slice down her body. Golden sparks protrude from the opening, the beating of a drum is heard. I release my hand from his captivity and allow him to feel the pulsing. I wave the sparks away, and move my eyes down to the object my hand is holding. “Hello, God,†I say. 

Shelby Kienzle-Pappalardo
Hospital
Dignity
The Little Things
Her Grandpa’s Records When her grandpa passed away, they sifted through the dusty old boxes in the attic. In them, they found all the music of her mother’s childhood. She looked through the jazz albums and wrote them down. She still listens to them now, to remember her mother by, on a smaller machine. The Hummingbird Her family’s house was home to many animals, but there was one in particular she loved. It was a little hummingbird that would visit their garden every so often to taste the nectar of the lupines planted there. She loved watching the blur of his wings as he hovered over the flowers. He was a tiny but powerful creature. She loved the hummingbird because he was a pet that was free to come and go as it pleased. Though she did plant extra flowers that would attract her free bird. The Lamppost There was a lamppost that stood on the corner of her street. There was a boy who would sit under that lamppost to read mystery novels from the library a few blocks away. She guessed it was because he wanted to be a mystery himself. But that lamppost was no mystery to her. It was a sign that she was almost home. So that’s where she would stop too. The School She didn’t love school. She was always scolded for looking out the window. She looked out to imagine the hummingbird buzzing his wings impatiently at her so they could race back to the lamppost and plant some new flowers. Her teacher would snap her out of it and tell her to stop daydreaming. There were math problems she needed to complete. She stopped trying. Her Father’s Words She overheard her father saying that “she needs to grow up,†to her brother. I overhear her later saying that she “never will,†and then a bottle shattering those words against the wall. The Ticket As soon as she was old enough she got a one way ticket out. She left the hummingbird, the lamppost, the school, and her father behind. Or maybe just the bottles that had consumed him. And the words the liquid twisted out of him. The music came along in her little machine and in the box full of her grandpa’s dusty records. She knew they would end up broken if she left them there. Her Absence The house became peaceful to the outside eye. She had reminded her father of his late wife. Her brother didn’t. There were no more shouts or shrieks of breaking glass. Down the street, the flowers wilted under the lamppost. Her father didn’t care, and no one else hung around town long enough to look after them. The Return On the day her father passed, she came up to check on the flowers she had planted by the lamppost. She walked down the street, humming a little jazz tune. And as she walked up to it, she saw her hummingbird and a new lupine plant. And me. Mystery book in hand. “Where have you been?†“I went to teach kids how to dream.â€â€¨ 

Alexandra Neckopulos
Falling Leaves
I used to think God created storms When he was angry When there was bad When there were sins When there was pain When there was suffering
 I used to see Rain As tear drops Thunder As shouting Lightning As beating 
 I used to feel The wind before the storm As a breath From God Warning me That the planet Had done evil 
 On one of the roads I have traveled, I learned that the storm, The rain, The thunder, The lightning, Is not, in fact, God Punishing

The Storm
Letters for Angelina
On that road That I traveled I learned that God Gives us storms So that we can learn to Dance, with the rain Sing, with the thunder Jump, with the lightning 
 On that road That I traveled I learned that God Gives each creature Of his creation Their own storm and asks them to walk through it 
 To walk through it To find The warmth The comfort The light From the sun. 

Caroline Wolfe-Merritt
hannah tells me that thomas has the music taste of a teenage girl but i don't tell hannah that i suspect i'm still a thirteen year-old girl on the inside, which is maybe why i'm spending so much time listening to ed sheeran sing love songs like i never got past being a college freshman with a middle school-esque crush. hannah tells me that it's comforting how frost purrs like chuck and i guess i've never thought of the sound that way; i've been too busy straining to hear the next thing to break. i try to trust them both and i try to believe that i sort of succeed, this poem exists, after all. hannah tells me about the two humans who are in love with her and i nod sagely, like i understand, but really, she makes me feel young with curiosity about what it might feel like to be so magnetic to love. hannah tells me about the many different names that she has been given and i think about how i'm still waiting to fall in love with my own and that maybe i could give myself a new one though i wouldn't know what to choose if i could. hannah tells me that she's making collages from national geographic magazines and plasticky mica flakes and that one's an ode to periods, or something like that, i only remember the purple one with the little black lines like a topographical map. months later i slice envelope flaps off with an x-acto knife then glue them back again, but sticky side down. and maybe it's all a waste of time to someone else but i call it art, because it will be someday, and what is art if not taking things apart then putting them back together into something new?

uncommon collage
glass-walled galleries, art in ritzy white frames, no touching, but no one sees the way we toss it around in our studios. podcasts blabbing, clay on the waistband of my underwear, clay fingerprints on my cellphone, oops my phone just went into the developing tray, does this dress make me look artsy? printer's ink staining sweatshirt cuffs, teal smudge on my nose, acrylic paint flaking off earbuds, origami boats stacked on textbooks and grass growing in cardboard boxes. wall space: gone, floor space: obliterated, dear roommates i'm sorry. i'm so disorganized, i'm sorry. i'm so weird. college studios, bedroom studios, waking up with pens and photographs between the sheets, studio-studios, my car is a studio, don't set the drawing down on the dirty dinner plate, don't drink the paint water by mistake. crying in ceramics, sneaking tea into the darkroom, extra scissors in my backpack, there's more photos to edit and professional lighting is way too hard, painting on a bookshelf-turned-easel, octopus sculpture living in the closet, have i left the studio today? typesetting till midnight, losing the ruler, now the installation wraps the room, dropping framed photos (let's just use tacks), my face looks like a pizza, do i deserve a self-portrait? the bio photo is prettier. falling outta love, creating away the heartbreak, falling in love, oh no now i'm writing poems all day, it's not talent, it's just a lot of work, but maybe it's a state of mind and oh, this idea's gonna keep me up tonight.

Wide Pumpkin
the other side
Falling Water
Heart is tranquil, tears are dry, pain is gone. Arms outstretched, pull you close Pick you up, like a mother and her newborn. You are quiet, comfortable, content. He understands, He gets you back. He lifts you. Your soul, your passion, your love, You did not need to live forever, You created something that would on its own. Together, you fly away, Fly away, to a new beginning. 

Blue Jay
anna barrett recently graduated from Earlham College. She likes to take photos and write and I guess we'll see where that takes her in life. ellie hasenberg is a junior at the Charles E Smith Jewish Day School in Rockville, MD. She enjoys basketball, softball, sailing, and creative writing. She specifically enjoys reading and writing poetry. shelby kienzle-pappalardo is a social worker and fiber artist based in Richmond, VA. She is passionate about social justice, her cats, and seeking magic in the mundane. 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 alexandra neckopulos is a transplant from the Chicago Suburbs who spends her time drawing the architecture, objects, and small spaces that catch her attention. Searching to expand her black ink drawings and add color, Alex joined the Visual Arts Center of Richmond as a studio monitor for the Printmaking Studio. Now she is working on creating a series of hand drawn silkscreen prints. afia faiza shopno is a teenage girl from Bangladesh who is in the 7th grade. She loves to perform many co-curricular activities such as painting, crafting, story writing, etc. She finished primary school among the top 4 students in her class, and is multi-talented, having won many international prizes around the world. Afia is the elder daughter of her very supportive parents, Fahmida Osman and Osman Khan. She loves Antonym from the core of her heart for their amazing works! caroline wolfe-merritt is a recent graduate from Earlham College, and an aspiring ecologist. In her free time she loves hiking, photography, and birding.
contributors
anna barrett ellie hasenberg shelby kienzle-pappalardo johanna monson geerts alexandra neckopulos afia faiza shopno caroline wolfe-merritt