Milk
By Gabrielle Mott
The children leave out milk for the farm cat, and it’s the ghosts who drink it. They come on light feet and dip their faces into it. They come over straw, over turf, raise their hollow eyes up to the sky and wish they could lap the moon up. They come in pairs, in trios, and dancing the waltz. They come over hills and rolling earth as the oxen plod, and the sheep chew cud, and the hills have turned to purple dust.
These beasts, too, are ghosts.
The oxen butt their heads against machines they don’t know the names of and kick up phantom dirt. The sheep stomp their cloven hooves and look to the farmhouse. What do they see? Strange faces silhouetted by glass. The cats sing of black sky and stars bright enough to burn holes in it.
An army of once sickly kittens arrive— now radiant. They cartwheel and caper to invisible rhythm; they dance their runcible dance. They yowl like banshees; they stagger like drunks. Didn’t the stars used to shine brighter? They’ll ask anyone who’ll hear. When they tire, they bow to ghost-crickets and tip their ghost-hats to ghost-mice.
The frogs have stopped singing and the grass smells of phenolics. The pale morning sun rises like a cold promise.
THE END
Author Bio: Gabrielle Mott is an 18-year-old author living in Carlisle, Massachusetts. Recently, she received a Scholastic Art and Writing gold medal.