Anureet Watta In the future, somewhere

Was wäre, wenn es ein Haus gäbe, in dem jeder willkommen wäre. Ein Gedicht von Anureet Watta über ein Zukunftstraum und ein weiteres mit dem Titel „The Government has it under control“ – beide in der englischen Originalfassung.

We build a house, all queer
and everyone is invited to stay –
even the blue lovers, I’ve kissed in the
middle of the night and vowed to forget
next morning, whose bitter taste and familiar
bruises still inhabit me – even them,
We all snuggle under a roof made of clouds.

It is always twilight in here, the sky candyfloss
and air we drink like cheap rum. We sit on the
floor, even when there are chairs. Deadnames lay
dead. A door that doesn’t slam, a money plant
in love with our cherry pink photo frames,
Lorde plays so often, we rub the speakers
and she appears – a genie, and gives us
more broken metaphors to cling to.

We all fit, no one’s limbs get in the way
of another, no ground rules –
except, we leave out shoes on front door,
there’s no broken glass or shattered
expectations hidden beneath the floorboards,
we walk on cold tiles and our feet soften.
The catch in our throats dissolves, no one
stays awake listening to the sound of footsteps.
No one sobs in the privacy of the bathroom,
you can cry anywhere - no one asks to fix your face.

At first it’s tough,
the familiarity of angst drips
down the walls, and we all waddle,
knee deep, through the remnants
of people we used to be, but our thirst
has always swallowed our habit of sinking.
I hold K upside down, and all the knives
fall out of her pocket, and so does
the guilt. I hold A’s hand long enough
for their fists to unfurl.

We spend hours being tickled by the sofa,
slouching our way through the days.
All the clocks come apart, bored dials
and yawning glass and tired hands,
we never run out of sunsets and
sunrises and glorious futures to peep into.
We gaze at our lovers‘ faces, unhurried,
watch our mint green walls,
fight over the best way to make
strawberry jam or the enormousness
of a whale’s heart.

Most days we sit idle and
on the lap of joy, and for
all moments, unafraid to unravel.
Nothing in this house can hurt us,
not even ourselves.

The Government has it under control

everything really,
the postcard I write to my lover,
the prime minister licks the stamps for me,
the home minister checks for grammar.

Peace is restored,
no revolution is allowed to litter the street
no interruptions to the machination of peace,
we ignore our blood soaked newspapers,
there are 144 ways to do the cavort of normalcy,
and you can learn it on primetime news.

To the funeral of freedom, no one wears black, only khaki,
no one mourns, no one wants to disturb surrendering of hope.

The leash is so long, you can go for a walk now,
The leash is so long, you can make a fancy noose.

And at night,
the delicate dance of teargas smoke,
the familiarity of censoring your own mind.
Thank god, we are safe now,
we have government issued gunfire to sleep in.