Ajeeb Dastan

Via Scroll

I’m trying to increase my suffering in other ways — jogging very early in the morning, all this dental work in quick succession, my numb mouth, wet drool, I try to make life hurt again, shoes too tight, thighs rubbing together, plucking thin hairs off my bent knees, some days I eat vegetarian while the rotisserie chicken in my fridge begs to be torn apart. I stop at yellow lights now. Whatever it takes to increase production. As I sit idling in front of a passing train, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes, the cars behind me reversing, turning back — but I’m in love and I don’t have anything else to do. I know the sad train ends.

It’s like this, the king marries a commoner, and the populace cheers. She doesn’t even know how to curtsy, but he loves her manners in bed. Why doesn’t the king do what his father did, the king’s mother wonders— those peasant girls brought in through that secret entrance, that’s how a kingdom works best. But marriage! The king’s mother won’t come out of her room, and a strange democracy radiates throughout the land, which causes widespread dreaming, a general hopefulness. This is, of course, how people get hurt, how history gets its ziggy shape. The king locks his wife in the tower because she’s begun to ride her horse far into the woods. How unqueenly to come back to the castle like that, so sweaty and flushed. The only answer, his mother decides, is stricter rules— no whispering in the corridors, no gaiety in the fields. The king announces his wife is very tired and has decided to lie down, and issues an edict that all things yours are once again his. This is the kind of law history loves, which contains its own demise. The villagers conspire for years, waiting for the right time, which never arrives. There’s only that one person, not exactly brave, but too unhappy to be reasonable, who crosses the moat, scales the walls.

Takeuchi said, "Japan currently has no legal system in place for same-sex marriage, so unlike heterosexuals, homosexuals have to deal with growing old while being unable to advance to the next stage of life, even if we wanted to. My paintings right now serve as a place where I can vent the emotions I feel from these circumstances."

'Perfect Day' by C.K. Koh, oil on linen, 2026 (via Whitestone)

'The Last Hunt' by Clausutta, oil on canvas, 2026 (via Whitestone)

'Safe with You' by Clasutta, oil on canvas, 2026 (via Whitestone)