Finding My Place as a Transmasculine Slut
Since coming out as trans, the idea of sex with cis guys has gotten more complicated: can I fuck a straight man if I’m transmasculine?
Wild, Fat, Queer and Black: How I Became Free In The Mountains And Never Left
If you have ever met a mountain, you know that can’t nobody really own a mountain because they are too majestic, too strong, too beautiful to be tamed or owned. So I guess mountains are kinda like Black folk.
The Angsty Buddhist: Chronic Pain & Trying Not To Be A White Yoga Lady
I’ve been told I should try to reclaim my ancestral healing practices, and this is something I would like to do. When I try to learn about Chinese things, it feels performed. I wonder if me learning qigong is any better than white lady yoga.
I Stopped Tweezing in Quarantine and Realized I’m Nonbinary
On the 24th day of quarantine, I turned on all of the lamps in my room and took off all my clothes. Then I stood in front of the mirror and stared.
Seeing the Wind: How It Feels To Be A COVID Nurse
The first time I took care of COVID patients, I felt helpless. I’d lost access to my purpose, to my spiritual practice that lives within deeply connecting to my patients. I felt undeserving of human connection. I’d become a “dirty” nurse.
The Angsty Buddhist: Learning Anger And White Buddhism
When it comes to Buddhism and cultural appropriation, I still sometimes worry that I’m making a big deal out of nothing, that I’m angry for no good reason.
Giving Poppers to Cis Women
“A cultural exchange from a person with a prostate to those without.”
Kamala’s First Novel Zigzags Is Out Today!
Ultimately, Zigzags was fueled by the nostalgia of all the places I’ve loved and left and missed. There’s a lot of flirting and parties and witty banter, but it’s very much about the necessary and heartbreaking recognition of when it’s time to move on.
The Time I Wanted to Hug a TERF
A middle-aged transmasculine butch person meets a trans-exclusionary radical feminist in the vast forest of Tumblr. What happens next is both predictable and unexpected.
How Reading A Queer Latina Writer Helped Me Understand My Mother’s Story
Growing up, I felt I wasn’t enough. Not white enough. Not Latina enough. I’ve tried to look to my mother’s story as my own missing piece. I’ve made her story into a key that will unlock a feeling of place and belonging. As a writer, I look to stories to guide me.
The Angsty Buddhist: Growing Up Kinda-Sorta Buddhist
At my Catholic all-girls middle school, I liked to tell people I was Buddhist. It was my feeble attempt at preteen rebellion. I enjoyed interjecting, “Oh yeah? Well, I don’t believe Jesus was real because I’m Buddhist!”
Growing Up With “Mucho Mucho Amor”: How Walter Mercado Defined My Life
I grew up in a conservative family so I never really knew the words to describe who I was but when I saw Walter Mercado in his finery and elegance, I knew I was like him.
Con El Aceite de Coco Nos Sanamos: Lessons From My Elder
In Ifa, a Yoruba-based religion, we believe that when we die, we are reincarnated into our same family lineage. I’ve imagined all the ways in which it would be possible that my grandmother was once my sister, or my aunt, a friend in a past life or even a version of me. We depended on each other in so many ways.
Everything Is Subject to Change…
I idolized Shane, and the only trans man in the series, Max. I wanted to mirror their everyday existence. I wanted to emulate their cool. I wanted the attraction they seemed to be dripped in. I wanted the clothes they wore, I wanted my jeans to have a hole in the crotch like theirs did.
The Labyrinth Closet
We’re always coming out. As an: anime fanatic, manga-collecting Pokémon plushie hoarder; as a giddy, youthful ray of sunshine and not just the dense, American Dream-deprived immigrant, prompted over-thinker — I realize I am more than any of these individual rooms at all times.
Straight, No Chaser
In the U.S., mass graves have been uncovered as developers unearth land for future projects. People claim we are experiencing the pandemic collectively — but economically, politically, and geographically, we are not. Look where we get buried. Look at who gets buried.
A Scrutinized Body Becomes Art: How Makeup Helps Me Manage my Body Dysmorphic Disorder
Often, use of makeup, especially as a way to cover up perceived flaws, is seen as a symptom of body dysmorphic disorder. But for me, using makeup is not a way to hide what I look like. Instead, it’s a way for me to be seen.
Letting Go of Latinidad
This Latinx Heritage Month, I’m calling for non-Black Latinxs to reflect on the ways in which we’re aiding white supremacy and how we can instead be accomplices for the liberation of Black people.
14 Knuckles: Always A Fistee, Never A Fister
My acceptance of my own pain allows me to have the kind of sex that is rooted in the specificity of my body. I don’t love the idea that I’ll never fist, but I do love the idea that every act of sex I engage with is collaborative. Queerness reminds me that there is no standard way to fuck or live.
When Other People Get to Give Away Their Binders
Getting top surgery with my butch identity is no longer some unattainable fantasy. Now the question firmly rests with me: do I want to go ahead with it or not?