Queer poetry used against Dilma’s post-coup hangover

In “There is no sin where I came from” (Editora O Sexo da Palavra, 120 pages), Kaio Phelipe emerges strong, resilient and confident in his choice to abandon his fragments, the records of a life of yesteryear, full of pain and conflict, to move forward. The author knows the power of his experience and believes in the value of images deep down, but recognizes their irrelevance within a universe of billions of humans producing stories and leaving fragments.

In the rhythm of a treaty and a prayer, Kaio does not pass by indifferently the people who, due to a political position rooted in the racist, misogynistic and homophobic patriarchy, condemned the country to suffer the second place in the world with the most deaths from Covid-19. In short verses, with a ragged breath, in a limiting situation, there is still room for hope that learning will make us seek a better position as a nation.

“This is my first book of poetry. I started writing it right after the pandemic began, in the face of the health and political barbarity and the biblical speeches of those responsible. While in quarantine and pondering how we ended up here, at an unimaginable point in history, the violent beginning of the 1920s, I decided to list what I understand as some starting points: the cases that change the days and require a position,” says the author.

“There is no sin where I came from” is a portrait of the psychological situation of people who did not participate in the coup, but who felt its consequences like no one else, and their formulations for the future are full of lessons learned and resentments.

“When right and wrong easily mix before our eyes, poetry delivers the truth and it is important to know what our tools are. With this book, I also intend to open some veins that the LGBTQIA+ literature category does not cover and, in addition to sex, sexuality and declarations of different loves, I take the opportunity to talk about friends who died, those who are alive, carnival, family, technology, longing, geographical errors.”

He explains that what unites each page is the reality “of a country that uses sin and faith as forms of manipulation and extermination. Paraphrasing Paco Urondo, in ‘Instructions for Avoiding Bad Weather’: Poetry hurts these sons of bitches.”