to those who could
By kevin martens wong zhi qiang
originally published wednesday, 21 february 2024
on tigri sa chang
Koitadu | Content warning
Please first read about my writing in the Skribadorang or Writing section on the Igleza page here before reading the piece below so you have advance warning about the rather spicy things that I often like to write about, and why I choose to write about them, especially in terms of subverting unhealthy stereotypes about gay people, Kristang people, Creole people, Indigenous people, masculinity, neurodivergence, the body, healthy forms of attraction and sexuality, and using my writing to process the severe individual, collective and inter-generational trauma and abuse I have faced across my life.
For Azmi and Jings;
yo irei kung bolotu, agora kung pra sempri.
To you,
who said:
Kev.
I always knew
who you were.
Long before
you will be Merlionsman.
Long before
we will even understand dreamkeeping,
let alone what it means to be friends:
please give your best self to me.
Your fears.
Your hidden, terrified tears.
Your insecurities
because I know
you are more than you seem.
Especially to yourself.
Everything still unseen
in 2012,
and even in 2021:
I know one day
you will finally be free
to blaze with the light of the sun
and to be who I knew
and know you are.
To be so fully the Kevin Martens who said
Let's go as far as we can
together.
Let's fight the world
and make it better.
The Kevin who was always Dragon Reborn
and our greatest, fearless champion:
give your future to me, Kev.
Your fire.
Your Beyond.
For I will keep them all safe for you.
I will guard them so fucking crazy tight
especially when in the years to come,
you lose
everything
and
everyone
and every part
of the warrior
we both once knew
you knew
you were.
You are.
And will always be.
Kevin Martens Wong.
Champion of the free.
The Kev
who never stopped honouring
Jing Wen.
Who never stopped believing
in Azmi.
The Kev
whose best and bravest self
we protected.
Whose courage
we cannot ever say we inherited
because we gave it to him
in all the greatest and smallest ways
even and in spite of everything that was fated
to happen.
In spite of it all;
in spite of them all.
Look at you now, Kev,
and all you have done under heaven.
For all those who could believe
love, and kindness, and hope, are not just the greatest weapons:
but for all those who could always see
that the greatest gift one can give back to another
is one's own full, beautiful future vision.