Something about clean love

Georgia Ehrlich '23

My sister and her boyfriend came to visit last week. Her room was a mess the whole time. There were crumpled-up spindrift cans on the floor, ripped tissues scattered around the trash bin, and clothes sprawled out like hair spun on the wall of bigfoots shower. Her room was stuffy; like the “before image” in a Marie Kondo room revamp. It made me think.

When I was in a relationship, the same was true for me. I would be lying if I said it wasn’t. My room would be pristine. He would come. And when he would go, he would fail to take two dirty towels, a glass of unfinished water, a pair of hole-filled underwear, socks, and me with him. I cleaned up the mess.

After saying my dreaded goodbye, running up the stairs, and finally laying back in my bed, I would get this sinking feeling–I would realize I just got away with detaching from reality while my room suffered the consequences. Time and time again my room became the personification of my abandoned responsibilities. It became the regurgitation of the relationship’s slight careless dysfunction: the bed sheet flipped sideways, wet swim shorts soaking into the hardwood floor.

Even though it might take some time, I am looking forward to a clean love. Yes romantic, sweet, and warm, but clean too Clean first

Now, this is not me being anal It is just what I deserve I deserve to coexist in an equal space where reality does not warp but melts. I deserve someone who wipes the splashed water off the side of my sink, who makes my bed for me while I continue to lay in it I deserve a clean love

Yes, a clean love

Windex for Valentine's Day

What could be better?

you hear!? There’s a Crumbl cookies opening next week on 5th Avenue!" Ijeoma Nwafor '24

“We don't need another Crumbl Cookies” I said to my sister exasp the news. She seemed upset at my distaste. As if my lack of excite confectioneries was some kind of personal slight unto her. She sco mumbled angrily as she stalked away.

"We don’t need another Crumbl Cookies” I repeated to my friend her envy at my situation. “But it’s literally a block away from your h whenever!” she whined to me I said nothing I countered her expe indifference and slight annoyance. When it was clear she wasn’t go wanted, she sighed “Bruh, I cannot stand you sometimes,'' she sai “You don’t know how good you have it.”

“How good do I have it?” I thought to myself

Good would be being able to go to the mall on Saturdays. Instead because Harry Styles is having a concert 5 blocks away

Good would be being able to go to that small Ethiopian restauran Wednesdays. Instead of driving by there and finding that it’s been

Good would be going for a walk at the local park that’s been there of seeing on Twitter that it's been bulldozed and turned into luxur

This isn't good.

This is elderly people getting pushed out of homes they've lived in no longer afford their mortgage

This is small businesses closing down because they’ve lost all thei Wienerschnitzel’s

But hey what do I know? It’s totally not like I’m making an observa by the people who have the most power in America And I’m totall forced displacement.

No, I just hate Crumbl Cookies.

Moon in the Eye of a Pond

Page Goodman '23

In the darkness, there’s a band of lily pads underneath the dock. A bullfrog cries at the turn of the bend. It’s a different taste of peace here, crisp like ice and salty like snow. I can feel the wallow of the wind cascading down the shore. It grabs my wrists and pulls me towards the water, towards you.

I leap ankle-first into the shallow, toes greeting the weeds with a hesitant hello. The richness of this shade of green is potent, desirable only to the heart of the unloved. A twist of my head leaves my fingertips kissing bliss and my torso turned towards infinity. Here, at the crux of being human, we dance. A splash of water hits my face. The current drags against my stride. You giggle, and I think I hear a wind chime. Your arms are outstretched, and it’s outlandish and foolish and beautiful and I’m falling into them for evermore. We spin upwards as wisps of the eve, as daughters of the dell. I can feel a heavy hang in the air as we tango away from the worries of the world. There is nothing else for us but this. There’s a moon in the eye of the pond, a glittering pupil in the glass of the swamp. In the chaos of a storm she’s the only one who knows where to go, and she always ends up here. Entangled in affairs she can’t claim, oceans she can’t scale. She doesn’t run from me, and I take it as chasing. We’re dancing in an empty ballroom, gowns sweeping the dust off the floor. We’re dancing and she smiles, and her face splits in half as she slips right through my hand. I could’ve sworn these were champagne problems. She didn’t even drink.

My heel is pruning in the thick moss. It’s just me and the moon, here now. It’ll always be just me and you, waltzing in the water to the brink of dawn.