Con una salchicha melosa y vegana que crece sin que nos demos cuenta. The only response, of course, to Parajanov's pregunta: How am I to protect the wax-built castles of my heart from the devouring fires of your love? I'm waiting for her heat, a pomegranate seed redding my bottom lip, the floor of my jaw weighty. My teeth have become used to her nails knocking for entry. My gums to her searching tongue. I've been brushing longer than usual, flossing enough for her to call thr

We can’t end where we begin – we pushed back from a sunny shore, from the waving arms of plump tourists on Bourbon Street. St. Louis Cathedral’s stately spires faded behind us as we set sail towards the Bywater, a path of her strawberry tinsel trailing us through the Mardi Gras. Outside the Ruby Slipper she, rosy costume shimmering, turned her mouth skywards in a lament. This place is past the climax, this place is dying, her bird hands pointed downwards, empty of cash and dr

When I wake up from surgery, I tell my mother three things. I tell her I can breathe. I tell her you need to read that poem to me right now- the one about gratitude and the turtle and, I tell her, you need to text her that I miss her and I’m so happy. I pause briefly and share that I, in addition to those three things, want a bagel and need to pee. Healing, counting milliliters of blood that come out of my chest. Holding my chest so I can hug you. Before my showers, I run my

I ask again, what makes a kiss trans and what makes a kiss queer? If someone is trans and queer and another just queer, is it a trans kiss or a queer kiss? Maybe it's a trans/queer kiss or even a queer/trans kiss? These are the thoughts that wriggle across my eyelids as I try to sleep after our first (kiss). Oh! And more! Against what marker does a kiss become queer? Is it when you use the chain round my neck to pull me towards you? When you softly kiss the hardness which p

It was a student mixer, in the lobby of one of those dead fancy accommodation buildings that looks like an expensive hotel and is occupied exclusively by young rich white couples, international students and wheelchair users. I think Issac hadn't arrived yet, or maybe he'd just gone to get me a drink, so I sat next to Morris at the bar. He had one of those faces where you feel like you've met him before even though you know you haven't. I spotted an opportunity. "Hey, it's fun

SHORT FICTION The corner of my mouth tingles where you kiss it. My cheeks glow under too-bright bar lights. I mumble excuses, tumble into refreshing darkness, and catch the first bus home. Was it a romantic kiss, or a kiss between friends? In the heat of pink strobes and shimmying bodies, cider still sweet on our tongues, the line between love and lust dissolves. My group of friends enjoy blurring those boundaries, on many a night out. ‘You’re not friends, Seph,’ Oz reminds

Your kitchen makes me think of God as you're kissing me inside of it. I feel it in the tissue of my breasts that a year and a half on estrogen way back when never quite made form. Our hair gets caught inside our lips and after a while I no longer can quite tell which strand’s mine and which strand’s yours. Tangled together like this I wonder, what are borders? I close my eyes as your hand makes waves out of my ears. The lightbulb flickers and I feel the memories come on. They

Dearest L, This March, as you know, the tip of my finger was ripped off by the bathroom door hinge at the Stonewall Inn. Blood dripped steady like mercury from a shattered glass thermometer. I laughed in shocked irony, then cried out in drunken agony. My friends hailed a cab and, as politely as they could given the panic overriding their inebriation, stated our need for the nearest emergency room. The taxi, now a makeshift ambulance, zipped in and out of traffic as legally as

I like the dance of making out, the unpredictability and shifting rhythm of two eager mouths. Playful, charming, and slow, gentle lips and cautious tongue; then aggressive, intense, lustful. Focused. Hungry. An open mouth turns a kiss from a show of affection to a declaration of desire. Even a hesitant introduction of tongue creates a spark, wakes up a clit, calls nipples to stand at attention. I like softly moaning into another mouth: little breaths of satisfaction, impatien

The first time I heard someone say, “Ew, they’re being gay,” it floated down from the balcony of the main hall like a heckle at a basketball game. It was summer at sleep-away camp—an all-girls camp for teens where the days smelled like sunscreen and grass, and the nights belonged to us. The main hall was our kingdom after dark. It sat close to the bathrooms and held all the games, so we’d gather there in pajamas and slides, braids and bonnets, laughter echoing against the raf

This is a story told through femme lips. Chapter 1: Femme lips as confusion As I attempted to respectfully put a $5 bill in the dancer’s garter – my desire locked tightly in my core so no one would be harmed – you snapped your head towards me, a spark of knowing flashing into your eye. “You’re not straight!” You exclaimed above the music, the voices, the revelry of the bar. The next thing I knew you had pounced on me. Quite literally. The music, voices, and clinking of glassw

Across the weekend I am there I visit Hay, the world’s first book town, traipse around exhibitions and second hand shops and markets, soaking in the buzz. At the festival, I buy too many books at the festival’s sprawling Oxfam stall and read them in the sun, Hay’s signature colourful festival flags shifting in the breeze around me. As always the slice of Hay that I sample is rich on the tongue, the flavours layered and complex, lingering.

Every year white tents and hordes of readers descend on Wales for the Hay Festival. They hear their favourite authors discuss their books, discover new writers and buy too many books in Hay-on-Wye, the World’s First Book Town. And I will be one of them, notebook and tote bag ready to be filled. It’s a packed programme, inviting authors, artists, performers and thinkers from across the world. So I’ve highlighted some of the talks I’m most looking forward to this year for you,

The thin white body of the woman floated face down in the dark water. Her hands drifted weightlessly against the algae-slick brick side of the canal as though feeling for a door on which to knock, a door that was not there. The short crop of bleach-blonde hair was muddied by aquatic weeds, a braid of green snaking down her bare spine and into the discoloured cotton underwear that lay translucent against her skin. On either side of her torso, just visible from above as the wat

I’m in the back of an Uber on a loop road at night that I have never seen before. I see the driver’s eyebrows in the rearview mirror and try to keep up a nonchalant attitude that won’t give me away. I look longingly out every window. The driver gestures toward his window. “You see out there?” It’s too dark to see anything in particular, but I nod anyway. He becomes grave with unnatural quickness. “Do not ever go there.” “Oh, really?” I say, still trying not to draw attentio

I am a woman with seventeen spreadsheets, three funding deadlines, and a compost pile that could testify in court. I label seed packets as though my seeds might arrive unannounced and ask to see my methodology. Sunflowers are numbered because chaos is not educational and hope requires a system. I run a business called Organically Grown Queen, which sounds impressive until you realise it means explaining soil health to people who think herbs come with instructions. I teach chi

Writer and scenic artist Elissa Morton visited the Old Royal Naval College and the University of Greenwich to hear from the people behind the iconic visual world of Bridgerton. After waiting for a moment in the venue's gift shop, purusing tote bags and pencil cases, I knew it was time to enter the hall. Not because there was any kind of announcement, but from the eruption of cafe chairs scrapping across the floor as guests rushed to the hall's entrance. As we made our way in,

Jilly sat at the table as her father packed their few clothes into a suitcase, a battered old blue one with a broken doo-hickey on one end - duct tape worked just as well as getting a new suitcase , he had told her once. The can of tuna had been polished off. Her father had eaten one spoonful. He said he wasn't that hungry after his long day; he lied, she knew. The candle flickered and stuttered, grew steady again. “Are we going to Aunt Belinda’s?“ Aunt Belinda had a s

The house was empty. The wake was over, and the guests had left. Jack had buried his mother. His father had gone a couple of years earlier. Now what? He kept thinking about the past. When he was a young adult and things seemed to be opening-up, before they all closed-off again as he got older. He had to get out. The mood in the old council house was all wrong and he felt like he was suffocating. Jack headed to the place where he always would start his escape as a teenager – C

Sound The first time I draped the beige tussar silk saree, I had no premonition. Even when I ran my fingers across the embroidered flowers and paisleys on the dull gold of the coarse silk while adjusting the pleats, there were no whispers. The soft rustles were empty. Except for the mellow jingles of the gold butterfly danglers and bangles beneath the whirring fan, there was neither a sigh nor a chide. I had expected at least a rebuke. When nothing came drifting in the aftern