The Boathouse

The gentle waves lapped against the rotting side boards of the boathouse. When the weather turned stormy, it flung piles of garbage onto the shore with every wave. The inside of the building reeked of dead fish and seaweed. A skinny alley cat stepped cautiously on the polluted beach. It stopped and nosed a dead minnow, and downed it ravenously.

It placed the paces of one paw on a puddle and quickly removed it. The ribs of the feline showed through the skin like a xylophone. It leaped into the boathouse in one bound, and scurried to a litter of squealing, starving kittens who were gnawing at the bones of another kitten who had very recently died of malnutrition. The family of cats knew little of their fate or the reason their companion died. Little did they realize they too would die from the polluted content of the fish. The kittens were content, but for how long?

Marion Pennell
Age 13
Pointe Claire, Quebec

published on page 131, however my grade eight English teacher (Mr. Holt, LPHS) only gave me a copy of the page, and not the whole book (an anthology I presume, similar to the one in which "Snow" was published).

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