from A History of The Care & Treatment of Unnatural Beasts

1. You are hereby awarded the honorary title of Khasma-nu-khaani. Husband-Eater.

2. Your late husband’s family may employ this salutation as a form of address/taunt/curse at their pleasure.

3. You belong to that rare order of cannibals who devour their destined mates as an essential source of protein [ref. Praying-Mantis]

4. The women of your husband’s household shall bleach all evidence of matrimony from your body. This dictates that you:

4.1 molt the plumage of all colored garments: become the un-feathered beast/ best flightless

4.2 sheath yourself in white attire for the rest of your days.

4.3 nevermore jangle glass bangles/ silver toe-rings/or hands sunset with henna.

5. Your hair shall be shorn to the skin of your skull.

6. The red sun in the center of your forehead obliterated.

7. Maternal status:

7.1 If you are a mother: You may be allowed to mate with a male member of your husband’s family, but this is not guaranteed.

7.2 If you are childless: your ill-Omen score is doubled, you may be abandoned on the shores of the river Ganga to bargain body for life

8. Submerge your sins in the holy river.

9. All who die in the city by the sacred waters are guaranteed a free pass to heaven.

10. Unite with river dolphin/ freshwater shark/ corpse-eating crocodile: make yourself into a new breed of monster.

Contributor Notes

Yamini Pathak is a former software engineer turned poet and freelance writer. She was born and raised in India and now lives in New Jersey. Her poetry and non-fiction have appeared in Anomaly, Waxwing, The Kenyon Review blog, Rattle, Jaggery, and elsewhere. She writes a monthly art column for The Hindu newspaper’s Young World publication. Yamini reads poetry for The Nashville Review and is an alumnus of VONA/Voices (Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation), and Community of Writers.