Like the Southern Islands, except you can’t see them:
they’re not part of this reality, strictly speaking, unless you want them
to be. Then they shimmer in and out of reality, just like those other places. Temporary
holding spaces, for the Kristang, the Eurasians, and everyone else who is hated
by those who need some nice, very well-defined categories.
I wanted to understand Sundaland so much better, and Southeast Asian Studies
but you made me invent islands in my head instead, to make up for the memories
that you utterly incinerated, when things did not go to plan. When the families
that did not meet your expectations spoke up, you also had a way of bringing your energy
weapons to bear on them. I hear the psychoemotional massacre was so devastating
the sea, until today,
still looks on distress
at the drowned ways to name these islands,
at the sundered fates of destinies that have never known the sanctuaries of you, and I,
and all we wanted to send
home.
All the faceless names that still roam.
All the ways you make me so utterly disgusted inside
to live on the same island as you, and imbibe
the stares that we are forced to share.
The burdens that we are forced to bear
because you were too scared of a completely new Kristang archipelago,
materialising completely out of thin air.