death roll call
Alexis McDonald
she quests for the gargoyled recluse that lurks on the balcony’s edge
dispelling secrets like rainwater from its gnarled snout and its dry lips
consecrating each whisper and collecting them in its lungs for a storm
gargling woes and wishes and wrongdoings around in a filthy throat and
swishing to wash clean its teeth, spitting them at the first clap of thunder
emptying the confidences of lovers and mothers and others into the street
grinning as it cries “i love you, but i don’t like you” to a mother’s child
becoming its prey, peering up at the crocodile echoing their worst fear
she quests for the insatiable telltale to wrestle from it the gravest secret
does the truth make us better for our virtues, or worse for our sins?
Lexi McDonald (she/her) is a senior English Literature and Creative Writing double major at Susquehanna University and enjoys reading, writing, teaching, and traveling. Much of her work incorporates vivid sensory imagery with trauma and topics of social justice and feminism, and these are her most rewarding pieces. She plans to go on to graduate school for creative writing and would collect degrees if she could afford it. Instead (or in addition), she intends to challenge young writers to be deliberate about their passions and futures in writing, and encourage them to write until they surprise themselves, and then keep writing.
Issue 15
2022