The moon has shrunk itself
into a single bright bead
inside the porchlight—

like a thought I meant to finish,
or an apology I kept editing
until the meaning fell out.

It’s the porch of the blue house,
the one just down the road
from that whole Malibu dream

we tried to inhabit.
And I keep replaying
our first Halloween party,

remember? You in the ruby slippers,
me in that stupid “KANSAS” tee
in BRAT font, like I was auditioning
to be a state you’d speed through
on your way to someplace shinier.

We called the place “Maliboo”—
yes, the pun,
I know, I know,           but back then
nothing haunted us. Not really.

Only laughter slipping
under the doorframes,

glitter welded to the baseboards,
a bowl of punch glowing
like liquid rubies
on the kitchen table.

And that cereal bar I labeled
“SERIAL KILLERS”—look,
I still think that was funny,

and the hush that settles
over a house after midnight,

the kind that makes
even cheap music
sound consecrated.

It stings now,

remembering how earnestly I tried
to impersonate a home.

But you, you were
a warm lounge of rooms,
a body I was allowed to unfold inside.

I guess my instability
always came with its own weather report—
a tornado advisory: forming fast,

hard to predict,
partial to Midwestern exits.

Anyway.

Back to the moon.

That night the sky was busy
trying to rename the dark—
maybe with an acronym,
maybe with a lacework of constellations
pulled over its shoulders like a tunic
instead of cinched around
its waist like a belt.
Something meant to hold a whole body,
not just keep the pants from falling.

Are you hearing any of this?
Are you still somewhere between the dream
and the soft exhale of the beach house,
that way it breathed between waves?

You never liked the water.
Not really.
You stayed in the dry sand,
tucking your toes under
like a confession.

And I walked where
the tide could reach me,
letting it kiss my ankles
and leave behind a footprint
like a notation,

a footnote of being,
a quiet little reminder in the margin
that morning had happened,

that I had too.

That’s how I write things now;
not to invent anything,
but to map the shapes
you pressed into me.

You. The house.
The porchlight moon
rehearsing its glow.

A dream,
so oddly specific.

– Marie Anne Arreola

Author’s Note: Talking about “Maliboo” now feels a bit like reopening a text thread in the sense that it’s familiar, a little exposed, and still carrying more than you remember putting into it. The poem started pretty instinctively. A lot of it comes from real moments, especially past Halloween parties, which were genuinely fun and a little ridiculous in the best way. The puns, the decorations, the whole “Maliboo” thing, it all came from a place of wanting to make something feel special, even if it was a bit scrappy underneath.

That’s kind of the core of it, I think. There’s humor because that’s just how I naturally process things. If something matters to me, it usually shows up with a joke attached. The “SERIAL KILLERS” cereal bar is exactly the kind of thing I’d insist on including, and in the poem, those moments sit right next to the heavier ones. That mix felt honest to the experience.

I tend to remember things in fragments, jumping between images, circling back, getting stuck on certain details. The porchlight, the house, the ocean—they repeat mostly because I wasn’t trying to make them symbolic so much as just letting them be what they were. Looking back, there’s also a lot in the poem about trying to build something that feels like home, and not being totally sure if you’re succeeding. That line about “impersonating a home” still feels accurate to me, as just that quiet realization that sometimes you’re trying really hard to make something work, and you don’t fully see it until later.

What’s been cool is seeing how this poem grew into something bigger. Over the past year, I’ve been developing “Maliboo” into a screenplay, and a lot of the same ideas are still there. The tone, especially (that mix of humor and sincerity) has stayed consistent. The difference is just that now there’s more room to explore it, more space for the characters and the world around them.

But the poem is still the starting point. It holds the original version of the feeling, before I tried to shape it into anything more structured. At the end of the day, “Maliboo” isn’t really about the party or even the relationship as much as it is about what lingers after. The small details, the jokes, the way a place or a person sticks with you longer than you expect. That’s what I was trying to capture then, and it’s still what I’m chasing now, just in different forms.