By Ada Lowenthal
Featured Art: “Olwyn (she/they)” by Jemma Leigh Roe

Of course I’m grateful for positive things—sunflowers’ petaled, oversized eyes, my size
on the rack at TJ Maxx, the surrealist lyrics of Beck’s “Hotwax”—but even on a Monday, I say ¡Olé! for negatives, which aren’t too bad either: my non-criminal children, my non-
biting dog, my non-stick pan frying drunken noodles, my chronic kidney condition remaining non-fatal. One page of my dictionary boasts six tiny-font columns of “non-” words that are, in fact, words. So it’s a non-issue. And certainly I’m safer with a non-
slip mat in the bath, probably healthier with non-fat milk in my glass, and undoubtedly thankful for non-addictive Wellbutrin and all classes of statins. When I spell non sequitur,
you know I speak French, non-toxic masculinity is tender and trenchantly fresh, inspiring
plaudits for non-violent protests, despite repeat beatings, concomitantly saluting brave
U.S. non-coms, like my late (toxic) father, and though Connecticut’s steeples skew Protestant, on non-denominational town greens non-combatants hallow the fallen with monuments, and at heaven’s gate, with the gods non-committal, maybe my mother won’t need to reproach me, if at least, just this once, I’m non-confrontational, while on the far side of the yard rise furious rows of sunflowers, each green stalk a tall cluster column, each potent head richly stippled with seeds, sundials under the sun.

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Ada Lowenthal’s poems have been accepted by, among others, The Sunlight Press, The Westchester Review, and The Ekphrastic Review. Most recently, she was a finalist for the Missouri Review’s 2025 Perkoff Prize. Previously, she was an architect and educator, and she lives in northwest Connecticut.