I Love You to the Moon and Back on My Chest

by Madison Whatley

Art by Jean Wolff

Between Spartan murals, you found me              sitting cross-legged

with a ribbon in my hair. I just wanted a date for homecoming because Gi and Nat were supposed

to have dates, and I always went with them. Both their dates bailed, but I liked that you liked

Skins and Fall Out Boy. We kept it going, but you didn’t want me to hang out with Nat and Gi anymore,

or even with Ana or Kirsten or Cyra, and when you got kicked out of your mom’s house and came to live with my grandma,

it only got worse. You became the standard for shitty guys,           the example I use to caution other girls.

You are the reason I can’t watch thrillers. You are just like Taye Diggs’ character

in ‘Til Death Do Us Part- less handsome,           but still pretty fucking crazy.

You are the guy who looks for me at the Starbucks on Stirling six years later,

and, yeah, they tell me every time you do it, but do not call me again- your apology is not worth the panic

in my chest taking me back to your hands on my shoulders in that parking lot,

the flimsy locket you gifted me swinging like a pendulum.

Jean Wolff, White/Naples, Acrylic Paint on Folded Paper

---