University of San Francisco's Student-Run Literary Magazine
Issue 35
by Mila Danilov I wake to darkness so opaque, I can’t see my hand in front of my own face. My limbs are clammy with salt-water air and I inhale the smell of my skin. It doesn’t smell of anything but residual bug spray. No warmth or familiarity. In the darkness, I can see a… Continue reading Juene
by Hannah Epstein I first properly met Madeleine at a birthday party in Teresa’s backyard back in the sixth grade. Before that, we had only seen each other in passing when our teachers would have us leave the school building in neat lines for recess. When I saw her back then, before I really knew… Continue reading Madeleine
by Chisom Okorafor Brown is the color of flesh, I say, And everyone nods. That makes sense, After all, your flesh is brown. And other have different colors. But that's not what I meant. I know flesh exists in other colors. Yet brown is the color of flesh. Flesh is meaty and fatty and sweaty,… Continue reading Brown Flesh
by Jessica Hsu I wanted to write a story. In a book I’d read, a little girl traversed the galaxy with a young woman. I wanted to write a story like that. Instead, I was stuck here. If this refrigerator in front of me was a planet’s surface, would it be like one of those… Continue reading The Dinner
by Kelly Talbot Leticia stood by the window, eating a bowl of oatmeal and studying the blue jays outside. As they hopped among the tree branches, they alternated between cackling harshly and singing pitch-perfect notes. Leticia wondered how many other types of birds had such a vast repertoire. Of all the birds... All the birds!… Continue reading After the Apocalypse, Day 3
for Chole Kerney by Daniel Barry i remember a runny nose, texting my roommates i’d be leaving and trading them for a suitcase with wheels. i folded all my socks and felt the loneliness, the quiet, the misery of feeling i was the only one in this lone room world. dad tried to book a… Continue reading Scaling My Mind and a Sickness
by Lena Beck 5:50 a.m. Gina filled the kettle with tap water and rested it on the stove coil. After flipping a switch to the left of the stovetop, the coil lightened to a warm red. She pressed her hands together and looked around. Everything else was done. Each square formica table was pristine: napkins… Continue reading Lunchtime at the Spaceworks Cafe
by Jos Burns The shop was carefully arranged, a dimly lit, fragile ecology in the damp evening air. Handwritten price tags dangled from thick cotton string, a casual denial of barcode technology. A few candles burned on a desk in the back, shedding almost as much light as the heavily shaded incandescent lamps. The shop… Continue reading The Transaction
by Sam Moe 1. Two places I can’t trust you with my heart: here, between wet cove rocks, you’re working through the idea of strelitzia reginae in the afternoon, I’m distracted by flower, leaf, low reef, the spindlebeak is blue and between the two of us I think we could outlast the storm. Will you… Continue reading Reckless Compression
by Katherine Hughbanks A bell above the door jingled, announcing Mark’s entrance to the shop. The din of rain and traffic outside hushed as the door stuttered shut, and a peculiar combination of eucalyptus and lilies greeted him, the scents taking up the space of the tiny store. He lowered the soggy newspaper he had… Continue reading The Blossom Shop, 1982
Ignatian Literary Magazine 