The Last House on Needless Street

by Catriona Ward

The birds make no sound. Maybe that’s the worst part. Birds aren’t like people. Pain makes them quiet.

My tail is long and slim like a wand.

When I find a verse I like, I try to remember it—like that one I just said. But it can be hard to hold phrases in the mind whole. It’s like oversetting a cup of marbles on a hard floor. They run in every direction into the dark.

It was the day I learned my purpose. All cats have one, just like all cats can turn invisible and read minds (we are particularly good at the last one).

Thoughts are a door that the dead walk through.

I feel like I don’t even know you anymore, I say, though of course all he hears is a hiss.