SEASON OF AFFLICTION
It was the time of seasonal change— the time to shed skins. The two of us opted to be part of some conspicuous catastrophe. But before we could do so you contracted fever. It raged so in you! Clasping the thermometer in your lips you ascended swiftly, climbing up, up and up, Fahrenheit degree by degree— one hundred and five, six, seven, eight…till you scaled the height of fever. You became the coefficient of the highest degree— all aflame!— till there were no more heights to climb, no more thermal coefficient, no more degrees left on the thermometer for you to conquer! And having climbed the peak of desire, the thermometer exploded, ejaculating a simmering liquid fire.
Even raging, all-consuming fevers will not destroy women. All they do is make them look somewhat more awe-inspiring— like incarnations of the goddess Kali— the more beautiful, the more awe-inspiring when raging….
And came a time when making the lidless thermometer a broomstick that you could fly on, you began to disappear into some dim disaster, my dearest witch!
For the first time in my life, I experienced such definite disaster.
The thermometer’s crater was still drip-dripping steaming sperm magma.
(translated from the original Bengali by Fakrul Alam)