Pepper and the Sun

Pepper, she was on the sun. Pepper, she was sunspots. Pepper, she made the sun bigger—furious and spicy. The sun swallowed Pepper, wanting her, calling her, and the sun changed shapes and colors, and the sun started to sing. Pepper, she was singing. She sang, Pepper, and Pepper—she drove right in, forming tunnels and tornadoes, bright tornadoes, fiery tunnels, and loud caves. Pepper, she journeyed to the center of the sun, naked and dripping, with eyes closed. Pepper, jump-roping on the sun, and the sun, it ascended and descended in rhythm—Pepper, the sun’s rose, pushed it up and down. Pepper, she bounced along, tumbling, cart-wheeling, and flipping, and the sun gave in and gave out. Pepper, she cried in the sun. Came morning, came night, Pepper was always there—wailing her arms, her breasts gave milk to the sun. Her breasts nurtured the sun. Her nipples singed the sun. Her hips and hands and hair, her knees and tongue, and her toes, were the sun. Pepper, she covered the sun with her body. Pepper, she fucked the sun and made the sun grunt and moan and she made the sun sleep. Pepper—the core of the sun, swimming in the sun’s magma. The craters of the sun were Pepper. Pepper and the sun—they were each other.

Shome Dasgupta is the author of I Am Here and You Are Gone (Winner of the 2010 Outsider Writers Press Fiction Chapbook Contest) and Tentacles, Numbing (Black Coffee Press, 2013). He lives in Lafayette, LA and teaches at South Louisiana Community College. His work has appeared in Café Irreal, Drunken Boat, Everyday Genius, Mad Hatters’ Review, and elsewhere. His website can be found at http://shomedome.com.