THE PALESTINIAN ALLEY CAT DIES

[image description: Two columns of text in newspaper obituary format read: The tawny, crust-coated animal in the corner of the ground floor of my East Jerusalem apartment building has been dying all night, curled up next to my friend’s door like a bundle of misplaced skins. He squeaks when he sees my shadow and twitches a paw, the rest of him as stiff as a bean-stuffed plaything in a toyshop window. He bares one row of golden teeth as if invisible fishing wire were hooked to his mouth, his gums black, his tongue black under dim fluorescent lights. Everyone holds noses as they pass, his reek eye-watering sour. I do not stop to hold him, only click at him and wish peaceful last breaths. (All the other cats are gone. I can’t find even one tonight, their soft-filth faces missing from the oozing piles of trash.)]