sapphicbeautyy

[sapphicbeautyy]

"Gnaw" is such a good word

[sapphicbeautyy]

[sapphicbeautyy]

There Used to Be a Lake Here Once (April, 2024)

I wrote this poetry collection when I was in college and it ended up getting acquired by the Writers Workshop, Kolkata- an Indian independent press that has published, among others, the works of Ruskin Bond, Vikram Seth, Kamala Das, Nissim Ezekiel and AK Ramanujan.

I grew up in Kolkata in the mid 2010s, whilst juggling multiple identities- Bengali girl child, queer teen brought up under a Catholic school system, later, a transgender enby poet and writer reconciling my personal and political worlds through academia and writing. This chapbook, divided into two sections, contains twenty-six poems on Bengali trans queer coming-of-age. I wrote it for the same reason I write all my stories: in the hopes that younger queer and trans desi youths can take some heart, and know they aren't as alone as I felt when I was a kid– even if the versions of India we have lived through are quite different, for better and for worse.

Anyway, cheesy stuff over. My author copies just arrived today and well, aren't they simply beautiful? Apparently, there will be more different colour editions. Which one do you like best?

[sapphicbeautyy]

THERE USED TO BE A LAKE HERE ONCE

A poetry collection about trans bodies, sapphic love, the desi queer community, and growing up Bengali in early 2000s Kolkata.

This is an indie debut poetry book by a non-binary Bengali author. Buying an author copy helps support me directly, as opposed to buying from a website.

GP*y: sritamasen1905@oksbi

P*yp*l: [email protected]

INR = Rs 300, USD = $ 4 (INR 300 converts to only about 3 USD, however, P*ypal skims off quite a bit, so if you want to support me, would appreciate if you paid around 4-5 USD)

HOW TO ORDER:

🦚 Fill out the Google form. There you can provide your personal details- address, pincode, country, name (PLEASE add the same name as a note in your Gp*y/P*ypal payment following slide 3; this will help me keep track.) as well as choose an edition of your preference and let me know what inscription/note you'd like me to add, if any.

🦚 After the base payment of Rs 300 is made via P*ypal or GP*y, I will confirm your purchase via Instagram DMs. Please ensure that your DMs are enabled, and if not, please mandatorily add your email ID.

🦚 Once I have finalized your order, I shall calculate shipping charges and let you know the additional prices to pay. For Indian folk, this will take 7-10 days. For those living abroad, please be patient, it might take slightly longer to calculate.

🦚 When you clear the shipping charges, your parcel shall be mailed soon after.

International purchasers, please try not to cancel orders after booking, I swear I'll have a meltdown if I have to figure out the P*yPàl and overseas refund transactions. Please, please be patient and cooperate; I'm a debut author and am still figuring out the nitty-gritties of overseas shipping. Also please note that I cannot 100% guarantee you a colour edition of your choice; although call me biased but they are all so beautiful. My payment details are on slide 3, and if you cannot purchase my book atm, I would appreciate a tip on my ko-fi!

Thank you for supporting a Bengali trans queer author; I hope I can write more for you soon.

For this sale, first priority will given to readers who identify as Desi, Bengali, LGBTQ of color and/or trans queer.

[sapphicbeautyy]

Do other writers ever get this like, hyper-specific dialogue exchange drop into their brains and you know exactly where these character are standing and what they’re doing and how they’re saying these words but that’s all you get. You don’t have much other context and this specific moment that exists only at this time in your headspace??

[sapphicbeautyy]

[sapphicbeautyy]

Ladies and gents I present to you...w*men

[sapphicbeautyy]

I am Jewish. I am an anti-Zionist. I am always and forever pro-Palestine.

My grandmother was born in Palestine before Israel existed. My grandmother, who died less than a decade ago (in her 70s) was already older than the settler colonial state of Israel. Judaism exists without Zionism. Zionism goes against the Jewish religion. Zionism is white supremacy.

From the river to the sea Palestine WILL BE FREE

[sapphicbeautyy]

YAYYY

FUCK YEAH FUCK I LOVE LIFE

Although I would like to add KOSA is still a big threat any Pro Palestine content will be wiped out please stop KOSA

@mirkobloom77 @ashlakh

[sapphicbeautyy]

Seeing footage of the aftermath of the flour massacre in Gaza is so painful

"Where is my daughter? Tell her I don't want flour anymore"

"My brother was shot holding a bag of flour. He kept holding on to it so they kept shooting him"

"Why does flour have to be stained with blood?"

Over 100 have been killed. Every single one of them hungry. Every single one of them has someone waiting for them to come back with the bag of flour.

Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war against innocent civilians. Israel ambushes starving Palestinians and shoots them. Israel is not fighting a war to defend itself. This is another episode of Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza.

[sapphicbeautyy]

Can the hungry go on a hunger strike? Non-violence is a piece of theatre. You need an audience. What can you do when you have no audience?

People have the right to resist annihilation

Arundhati Roy

"B-but Palestinians can get their freedom with peace not violence 🥺🥺" no. Screw your feelings. The armed resistance against colonizers and murderers is what will give Palestinians their freedom and what will eventually achieve real peace.

An enemy that bombs and uses white phosphorus against civilians doesn't know nor practice what your broken moral compass describes as "peace". Freedom was proven throughout history not to be achieved through kneeling and asking the oppressor to kindly stop. Freedom needs to be taken by force. Your little Utopian way of thinking doesn't work in the real world. Your feelings don't matter because you're not the one living under occupation. Your feelings don't matter because you're not one of the thousands of children who lost their limbs. You're not one of the children who became orphans due to this genocide. You're not the mother who lost her child to the carpet bombing. You're not the father carrying the remains of your child in plastic bags. You're not the newlywed woman who lost her husband. You're not the one at risk of either getting killed any second or losing your loved ones in the blink of an eye!

"Peace" is not really a thing you see during a live ethnic cleansing!

[sapphicbeautyy]

[sapphicbeautyy]

[sapphicbeautyy]

in light of israel's looming invasion on rafah, south africa implored the icj to call for the protection of palestinians with new preliminary orders. the icj denied this request, insisting that its january orders would be sufficient enough in ensuring the safety of people residing in rafah.

we have all seen how israel responded to the icj verdict earlier this month. they have all but intensified their attacks on palestinians, their favorite of whom seem to be children. this will end in a bloodbath. palestinians, already malnourished and living in literal tents, will be bombarded, they will be shot, they will be slaughtered. and when i say palestinians, a lot of them are actual toddlers. the videos coming out of this are proof enough.

at this point, it has been made amply clear that palestinians will never experience safety in their own homeland. a lot of the families in gaza are trying to raise funds to get out of it, because there's nowhere left to go.

there is nowhere left to go. if these people don't get the funds necessary to escape, they will die.

it's vital that you go to operation olive branch's spreadsheet, choose a family that resonates with you, and donate as much as you can to their gofundme. every last dollar counts. one dollar could be the difference between life and death for a family. please don't fall victim to the bystander effect. your contribution counts, however little it may be. and whether you're able to donate or not, spread this to as many people as you can. each second we stay silent is a second an entire family is brutally massacred.

[sapphicbeautyy]

Posting this iconic piece of media that I just NEVER found online isolated except in an archived reddit thread

[sapphicbeautyy]

[sapphicbeautyy]

lord the peasants are so loud today