our first issue
plumplumplum
Š The Plum Collection i
LETTER FROM THE EDITORS
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THE SPOONS
1. What my father taught me: to steal silverware and to smile like sunlight. 2. The grinding tension, the spoon’s neck bends. A study in passive resistance. 3. So with an heirloom silver spoon, I dug a tiny grave out of boredom. 4. “Nothing on God’s green earth as unnatural as the spork.” That is nonfiction. 5. Tea-set spoon in purse. Sugar-cube sophisticate, Daddy’s begloved girl. 6. The verb is the big spoon, the noun the little one. Sunlight where we bend.
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7. You, dirty and still useful, spoon in sink, sugarcrusted. Clean enough
~ zoe bodzas
~ anna lucia feldmann iv
GOOD BYE
your summer camp friend will never grey nor will you grow to recognize the way he strokes his thighs in agitation leaving tender streaks impermanent to the bleeding shins and almost kisses never touching never healing and september’s sun sets on bruises and potential
~ abigail weinberg v
~ anna lucia feldmann vi
MORE BEAR THAN BARE People have hair. It’s a revolutionary concept. Women also have hair because women are also people. Tiny follicles rooted on our skin, catching the light and traveling across our bodies, darkening like a curfew on more vulnerable areas; starting from our heads, arching over eyebrows, rolling along our armpits, towards regions confined in cotton underpants. There is nothing foreign or strange about body hair. Quite the opposite: it is natural and, evolutionary speaking, a survival trait. That’s why we haven’t lost the genetic information telling us we need it. Some people find it more hygienic or aesthetically pleasing to manage this hair. Others recoil at the thought of plucking an eyebrow. Wherever you sit on the scale of one to Rapunzel, you should expect to be accepted for the choices you make concerning your own body. If you want to shave, that’s fine. If you don’t want to shave, that’s also fine. Letting hair grow out can be one of the more liberating experiences vis-à-vis appearance keep your razor in hibernation and save yourself money, time and... chafing. Despite my highlights and groomed brows, I am able to let my armpit hair reach the length of European athletes seen on the first televised Olympics and wear a skirt when my legs are more bear than bare. I take pride in my appearance, which isn’t a notion reserved for females, and the length of my hair is in no way proportional to attractiveness, confidence, or political preference. Shaving does not equate to beauty. People have been shamed into thinking their body hair is repulsive so others can make money. Never allow someone to feel lesser than anyone else because they control their body - it should not threaten you. This brainwashing from advertising obscures the truth: that body hair is not the villain and we should not feel victimised by media obsessions.
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To realise this when insecurities are being manipulated to increase sales of superfluous products is a revolutionary concept... and one we should be teaching to others, so that I don't have to overhear people lamenting about feeling ugly because they are being made fun of for having body hair. There is something ugly about a situation where others can accost, and even abuse, a person who chooses not to shave and it is not the absence of shaving.
~ claire sosienski smith
~ anna lucia feldmann
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LETTERS TO ELLIA 7 hours 22 minutes playing time trapped in a spat out basement swinging your remote back and forth towards an oasis of virtual grass in retina displays your mother has told you to trim the grass seven times now wear a dress! do your hair! go to church! start your math homework! heaven is no place for washed out dreamers 7 hours 23 minutes playing time the taiwanese polyester babydoll of your favourite barbie doll is still thrown halfway across the basement your sims don’t bat an eyelash neither do you
~ fay asimakopoulos
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~ anna lucia feldmann x
CONTRIBUTORS
ZoĂŤ is a writing and anthropology student living in upstate NY. She's fond of grilled cheese, wordplay, and sensible boots. Abigail Weinberg is sixteen and spends most of her time weaving mental phrases that she rarely puts on paper. She is constantly narrating stories in her mind and can describe but herself to a tee. Raised on copious amounts of The Cure and Elvis Costello, Claire Sosienski Smith devotes her life to emulating Anne Hathaway in the princess diaries before they broke her glasses and brushed her hair. She tweets here, tumblrs here and roams the streets of the rainy English coast despite fully-functioning American citizenship. Fay Asimakopoulos is fifteen, self conscious, and indecisive; in short, in possession of a set of traits that drive one to either reclusiveness or the refuge of art. She likes to experiment to a bit of both, but finds herself sticking it up for the latter. Anna Lucia Feldmann contributed the photos that set the tone for our first issue, which were taken on a family trip to Bogota, Colombia, with a 35mm minolta x700.
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~ anna lucia feldmann xii
plumplumplum fin
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