The Blahcksheep

03/06/2024

💙 For the young who want to
by Marge Piercy

Talent is what they say
you have after the novel
is published and favorably
reviewed. Beforehand what
you have is a tedious
delusion, a hobby like knitting.

Work is what you have done
after the play is produced
and the audience claps.
Before that friends keep asking
when you are planning to go
out and get a job.

Genius is what they know you
had after the third volume
of remarkable poems. Earlier
they accuse you of withdrawing,
ask why you don’t have a baby,
call you a bum.

The reason people want M.F.A.’s,
take workshops with fancy names
when all you can really
learn is a few techniques,
typing instructions and some-
body else’s mannerisms

is that every artist lacks
a license to hang on the wall
like your optician, your vet
proving you may be a clumsy sadist
whose fillings fall into the stew
but you’re certified a dentist.

The real writer is one
who really writes. Talent
is an invention like phlogiston
after the fact of fire.
Work is its own cure. You have to
like it better than being loved.

Artwork by the wonderful

23/05/2024

To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.

~ In Blackwater Woods by Mary Oliver ☀️

Artwork by German surrealist painter Rene Schute 🎈

21/05/2024

Sit, drink your coffee here;
your work can wait awhile.
You're twenty-six,
and still have some life ahead.
No need for wit;
just talk vacuities, and I'll
Reciprocate in kind, or laugh at you instead.

The world is too opaque, distressing and profound.
This twenty minutes' rendezvous will make my day:
To sit here in the sun, with grackles all around,
Staring with beady eyes, and you two feet away.

~ Sit by Vikram Seth

🎨 by Kaoru Yamada

19/05/2024

'Susen Chan is an artist and oil painter currently living and working in New York City. Her work in recent years has centered on community portraiture and conceptual still life. Her paintings explore themes of race, community, immigration, prejudice, identity, family, longing, love, and loss. 

was born to a family of illiterate farmers, factory workers, and illegal immigrants turned merchants who originated from rural China and Taiwan villages. Her parents immigrated to Hong Kong in the late 1980s for factory work, and she subsequently grew up between Hong Kong (a former British colony) and the United Kingdom during the Hong Kong handover. 

From the age of twelve, Chen began commuting between a small apartment in Hong Kong and an all-girls British boarding school in England on a bi-yearly basis on scholarship. For college, she moved to the United States, becoming a first-generation American citizen.'

☀️🐑

15/05/2024

1.Hands of a new lover, unsure yet wanting. 

2. The tarot card reader’s hands, as she held mine in hers and placed them on top of the cards.  I swear, for a moment, it felt like I did know the future even before she uttered a word. 

3. My mother’s hands, skin stretched and a texture I have only ever seen on her. Not soft, not rough. Just pure skin taut on a frame. Diaphanous. 

4. I go to a museum and play with a motion sensor music installation. A man comes and asks me to close my eyes, takes my hands, with a museum-worthy ease, and shows me how the installation works. I stand there dumbfounded, hoping the colour hasn’t reached my cheeks, as this man with the softest hands demonstrates how the farther my hands move away from the camera, the longer the note is held. 

5. His hands remind me of a girl who was my best friend for two months in Grade 7. Her  laugh and the soap she used to credit the softness of her hands to, the soap I used that entire school year and next. The soap, when I found in a supermarket a decade later, I walked around sniffing the box for fifteen minutes while my friends picked chocolates to make me a cake with. 

6. Hands I haven’t touched yet, but imagine the crackle of the knuckles of. 

7. Hands I’ll never again touch and can’t for the life of me remember the texture or the shape and size of. Hands I hold the hardest in my dreams, and hope that one day, when I am falling and nothing feels within reach to hold on to, the memory of them holding mine will come and I’ll let go. Of the hope and the want, and fall with grace.

~ Writes Swapnil, an architect and writer based out of Goa 🔥✨

14/05/2024

'In 1906, Marc Chagall moved to St. Petersburg, the centre of the Russian artistic world. He studied under Léon Bakst at the Zvantseva School of Drawing and Painting from 1908-1910. Whilst there, Chagall's teachers introduced him to the works of avant-garde artists Impressionist Claude Monet, Post-impressionists Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Neo-impressionist Georges Seurat. The young artist also studied Caravaggio, and other Old Masters such as Rembrandt, and Vermeer. Moreover, while in St. Petersburg Chagall discovered the genre that would become a highlight of his career: theater set and costume design. During this period, he returned home frequently, and met his future wife.

Paris was at that time the centre of the modern art world. In 1910, Chagall moved there, drawn to this centre of creative endeavour. His timing could not have been bettered. Paris then was abuzz with the new art of Cubism. Cubism was the dominant movement at the time, though much of the French art establishment was still under the sway of older 19th Century ideas. Chagall was like a breath of fresh air, with his ideas of art as coming from inside, being an outwards projection of one's mind and psychic being. In Paris, Chagall slowly integrated into the art society of the time, and met a lot of influential Parisian bohemians like Modigliani and Delaunay. He became interested in, and incorporated into his painting, elements of cubism, and also new trends of, of example, futurism and orphism.

It was during this time that Chagall had his first commercial successes. He became an integral part of what later became known as the Ecole de Paris. Some of his paintings from this period, like Paris Through the Window, show his very successful attempts to fit into his new milieu, while others, like The Birthday, and I and the Village are filled with nostalgia for his old life in Vitebsk. The range of emotive and whimsical figures and motifs in Chagall's work led André Breton to say that he alone had returned metaphor triumphantly to modern painting. Some of the otherworldly, supernatural touches in his paintings were said to prefigure surrealism.'

🐑✨

13/05/2024

'I take in the reflection of my naked body. There’s a few changes but nothing to be upset about. This body has created life after all. Just a short, red scar is visible across my bikini line now. It really is quite small. I’m almost shocked by its size. Just a small scar that transitioned my son from womb to world. 

I won’t lie – labour is painful. No one can ever explain it to you and nothing will prepare you for it, you just have to experience it. A cesarean, well mine at least, felt unbearable. My stomach was numb and I couldn’t walk for four weeks, yet it’s now just that: a small scar and a lingering detail from the biggest and most influential moment of my life. 

Somehow, somewhere during the blur of my first month as a mother, I forgot about the pain. I forgot about my nine months of discomfort, and the post-partum incidents that were happening to me on the daily – oh, you know, milk leaking all over my shirt, the bed sores forming below my hips – the sexy stuff.

Now, when I think back to laying on the operation table, all my body feels is that rush of anticipation finally reaching its peak – my son taking his first breath and hearing him cry for the first time. Rough. Raw. New.

I drink my coffee with him on my chest or lying on the pillow. He’s happiest in the morning. He’s turned me into a morning person as I’m rewarded with giggles, smiles, and vibrant, pure energy I’ve never encountered before. It energizes me more than caffeine.

My days are filled with memory-making, finding moments to introduce him to new things, who I am, who his family is, and what the world is like. I enjoy our coffee dates where he naps in his carrier and I sit quietly without a laptop or screen in front of me. It allows me to tune my ears into the whispered opinions of outraged aunties who doubt he has enough sweaters on, or how dare I leave the house with him at such a young age. What a stupid girl.

He makes me better. I look forward to every new day, anticipating what new skill he’ll learn next. But more importantly, what he’ll teach me today,' writes , social entrepreneur, storyteller, and facilitator ☀️

12/05/2024

'Now in my ninth month, my presence overpowers every space I enter. But not this one. Here I feel wrong. Out of place. It is life, not death, that doesn’t belong here.  

I’ve known for the past six months that the next time I’d see my father would be at his funeral. I just didn’t expect it to be so soon.

Six months ago, I sent my father a letter asking him to never contact me again. I told him Matt and I were having our first baby, and that we wanted our child to be free of the consequences that came with his unpredictability. After all, I hadn't even met my father until I was ten years old. His reappearances in my life were random, infrequent, and disruptive.

His body now lies in an open coffin ten feet in front of me, and I possess none of the feelings I should have in this situation. I don’t feel loss, at least not a loss that I haven’t been feeling for years. I don’t feel sadness, except that which comes with all death – the sadness of endings.

I realize that I’ve never spent this much time in a room with my father before and that’s because this time he can’t leave the room.

I don’t stand at his grave long; I’m a bit out of breath after the climb. If the baby should come now, how would I get to the hospital in time with all these cars blocking the way to one tiny exit? I walk cautiously down the slope and wait impatiently with my mother and sister at the bottom of the hill for the cars to move, so I can leave this place. I don’t belong here. I don’t want to belong. I can’t play this part anymore.  

It occurs to me that my baby is like I was when my mother left my father: unborn and vulnerable.

The line of cars begins to snake forward. I ask my mother to drive me home. Matt will be returning from work soon. I’m eager to see him and for him to see me. I look down at my bulging belly, solid with life. I need to rest. I have a baby on the way. A baby I can’t wait to meet and already love,' writes Amber Christopher-Buscemi

12/05/2024

'I wasn’t treated respectfully when I was young, and this is my question to those who pushed me into motherhood at the tender age of 18: Was there no consideration for my wisdom? Did my child not deserve a mature and understanding mother?

As a new mother to a baby girl, I experienced severe pain when the doctor forcefully squeezed my body for breastfeeding, dictating that it was my duty as a mother to feed my hungry baby. I was so scared for my baby, but despite my fears, I summoned the strength, and prepared myself for the adventures ahead.

At that moment, I had someone who said to me “I trust you” and “I feel safe in your arms.” It was my baby, my princess, who made me feel I was enough for her.

I find myself torn between two dilemmas: 'I wish I had' and 'I am glad I did.' I relate to both in equal measure. While I wish I had more time to adjust to the facts of life, I am now glad to have a companion who understands and navigates these facts with me,' writes Kuldeep Kaur, an author, teacher and entrepreneur.

11/05/2024

Poetry by the brilliant Shazia ☀️🐑

A neurodivergent 19- year-old who is still learning about herself, you’d usually find Shazia either lost in an Ocean Vuong novel or watching people go by on the road with a marlboro in her hand and music blasting in her ears.

'When I first bit into a truffle, I felt like I was eating the world. Perhaps I would someday. I would write a blackhole on a page and swallow it and I'd have the earth inside of me. Being a poet has felt like ripping my nails off one by one and using the bleeding, exposed fingertips to scrawl nonsense on a page.

Art for the art's sake. It has also felt like making God with ink. I still continue to search for my own truth through the images I paint in my poetry and the concepts I touch upon. As I struggle to create something meaningful on a daily basis, I know I shall remain a person who might kill to be able to truly make someone's skin melt away with words.'

💜

11/05/2024

'Bobbie Russon's paintings speak to the quiet, contemplative and solitary place in all of us, usually featuring lone girls in a paradoxical moment of adolescence, caught between the needs of a child and the wants of an adult.

More as a metaphor for humanity than a literal interpretation. The girls can seem both victim and perpetrator, vulnerable and strong.

Russon's work speaks to us on an emotional level, it gives us time to stand still, time to reflect in what it means to be human.'

💜🐑

09/05/2024

a detective series from the 2000s we're obsessed with, public writing circles, an all-dalit comedy collective, sunscream! puzzle game, a new clothing brand we dig, what are we trend- na, tending to on bloom & more!

this week's fun listicle of tiny treats and terrific thoughts by Editor-in-sheep is out on our Substack (link in bio) ✨🐑

19/04/2024

this is for all the dreamers, romantics and idealists out there:

you're amazing

we see you

we believe in you

make love, make art

carry on!

also, petition to bring fun. back! how cool was this album?

🐑

08/08/2023

I took this travel and street photo narrative series on a short trip to the Scottish capital. I was enthralled by its mysterious magnetism.

09/07/2023

09/06/2023

Hey 🐑👋 let's write a collaborative poem together!

What small kindnesses do you appreciate? Tell us in the comments below 👇

We'll try and weave your responses into a verse 🙌

Remember, kindness is a chain reaction. It's a wave that keeps rolling, and all it needs is one person to start it 🌼

09/06/2023

🔥 A Mosaic of Identities by Vaani.

“…when people call her privileged, it is more the privilege she owns, to shed off some of these identity masks and live in some sort of a vacuum. That she’d rather be free from those. But can she ever be?

Am I a woman? Am I an Indian? Am I q***r?

What if I want to be nothing? And what if I want to be everything” writes Vaani.

Vaani believes she stands in between boxes and boundaries. Boxes and boundaries of identities, the in-between of black and white. She’s done her bachelors in Theatre, Psychology and English Literature - three fields that allow you to study the human experience in their own different ways.

08/06/2023

🔥 The Legacy of Forgetting by Rida Abdul Jaleel

Rida is a 24-year-old Literature Graduate from the University of Hyderabad, possessing a deep-seated passion for books, especially Contemporary and Indian Realism. Though initially drawn to poetry during her early years, it was in high school that she unearthed her talent for prose. Since then, Rida has pursued her passion through academic endeavors, crafting both short and long stories, and even venturing into self-publishing with her novel “What Lies Beyond.” Her work has been featured in publications like the Rathalla Review and Breakbread Literary Anthology.

Photograph by Theres Sudeep

08/06/2023

🔥 The Legacy of Forgetting by Rida Abdul Jaleel

Rida is a 24-year-old Literature Graduate from the University of Hyderabad, possessing a deep-seated passion for books, especially Contemporary and Indian Realism. Though initially drawn to poetry during her early years, it was in high school that she unearthed her talent for prose. Since then, Rida has pursued her passion through academic endeavors, crafting both short and long stories, and even venturing into self-publishing with her novel “What Lies Beyond.” Her work has been featured in publications like the Rathalla Review and Breakbread Literary Anthology.

07/06/2023

📕🐑 Looking for a unique sci-fi experience? 🚀✨ 'This is How You Lose the Time War' by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone is the book for you!

🔖With its captivating blend of romance and sci-fi, it breaks the traditional genre rules, immersing you in a world of letter exchanges between two rival time-travelling agents. 

🔖Our Editor-in-Sheep highly recommends it, describing it as 'This is How You Write Sci-fi: Infusing love, poetry, and boundless imagination into the genre.'

🔖Be patient, push past the first few pages, and embark on an impeccable literary journey.

🔖Have you read the book already? Tell us about your favourite quotes in the comments below 👇

06/06/2023

Zufishan Rahman examines the undervalued and unseen history of work for The Blahcksheep.

Do you think the new tradwife trend is propagating conservative agendas? What’s your take on this?

Zufishan is a 24 year old student. Her poems have been previously published in Nether Quarterly, Aainanagar Magazine, Maktoob Media, and LiveWire. Her most recent essay “Art and Propaganda: Reclaiming Narratives” was published in

05/06/2023

⚡ 🐑 "For me, people come first,” Neel declared in 1950. “I have tried to assert the dignity and eternal importance of the human being.”

🎨 Meet Alice Neel, an extraordinary American artist whose portraits captured the souls of friends, family, lovers, poets, artists, and even strangers.

🎨 Her paintings exuded expressive lines, vibrant colors, and a profound understanding of the human psyche.

🎨 What sets her apart from other painters? Neel painted women from a perspective uniquely her own. Her work shattered traditional notions of the female n**e, challenging the artistic norms of her male predecessors and the damaging effects of the male gaze.

🎨 Can you imagine the impact she made pursuing figurative art in a time when abstract art was all the rage?

🎨 It wasn't until the 1960s that Neel's talent gained the recognition it deserved. Today, she's celebrated as one of the greatest portrait artists of the 20th century.

🎨 Swipe to see some of her interesting portraits!

**e

05/06/2023

⚡ 🐑 "For me, people come first,” Neel declared in 1950. “I have tried to assert the dignity and eternal importance of the human being.”

🎨 Meet Alice Neel, an extraordinary American artist whose portraits captured the souls of friends, family, lovers, poets, artists, and even strangers.

🎨 Her paintings exuded expressive lines, vibrant colors, and a profound understanding of the human psyche.

🎨 What sets her apart from other painters? Neel painted women from a perspective uniquely her own. Her work shattered traditional notions of the female n**e, challenging the artistic norms of her male predecessors and the damaging effects of the male gaze.

🎨 Can you imagine the impact she made pursuing figurative art in a time when abstract art was all the rage?

🎨 It wasn't until the 1960s that Neel's talent gained the recognition it deserved. Today, she's celebrated as one of the greatest portrait artists of the 20th century.

🎨 Swipe to see some of her interesting portraits!

05/06/2023

💫 Are you tired of the same old boring advice from those other astrology columns?

Well, you're in luck!

🌠 Miss Prediction has the perfect advice for your troubled teenage soul.

🌌 Here’s what (not) to expect in June.

🐑 Read it only on The Blahcksheep digital platform. (link in bio)

04/06/2023

💫 Looking for some astrological guidance that's equal parts hilarious and useless? Well, you're in luck then!

👀 Miss Prediction is back with the perfect astro advice for you. Come, find out what June has in store for you. Plus there's a bonus World Update for you this month.

🐑 Head to The Blahcksheep digital platform right away to read it. (link in our bio)

🏷️Don't forget to tag your family and friends and make their day!

04/06/2023

“A fine Sunday morning…i wake up next to you. Time has slowed down for us. We make our breakfast. Slow dancing in the kitchen. The brewing ginger tea making things even spicier.

We watch our cat play around, and our houseplants sway in joy. The curtains are half drawn, perfect for just enough sunlight to let in. I read you my favourite book while The Beatles is softly playing in the background. You rest your head on my shoulder, our fingers interlocked, you look into my eyes, I look into yours…we’re looking at the stars.

Melting into each other; not just the bodies but the souls too. Tearing open our hearts, showing the wounds and vulnerabilities. And gently kissing the parts where it has hurt the most. You kiss my forehead, and wipe away all my worries. You kiss my eyes, and I see the beauty of the world. You kiss my hands, and the creases go away. You kiss my lips, and promise me a forever.

The sky is slowly changing its colours with the setting sun and the rising emotions. The dusk has faded into the dark. We turn on the warm yellow lights, snuggled up on the couch, cozy cuddles, sloppy kisses, watching The Office and laughing till our tummy hurts.

The city is moving on just like any other day, but we are frozen in our very own moment. I’m closer to happiness than I’ve ever been. If this is not love, I don’t know what is!”

Srushti Jagtap is a B Tech student from Pune. As a vintage soul thriving amidst the chaos of the contemporary world, she finds joy in discovering the intricacies of people, places, and their unique narratives. Her passions encompass photography, event hosting, reading, and sporadic writing.

03/06/2023

🔥 Ifrah Fatima shares Delhi with a capital D.

“My roommate managed to immortalize my long forgotten dream about Delhi’s roads by posting a blurred picture of me in an auto rickshaw on her Pinterest feed.

When I was a kid, auto rides in Delhi used to make me happy, and there was a soft whisper inside of me that said, “I want to study in this city.”

And mind you, I held that whisper more important than the promise I made to my father.

Today, I don’t really understand Delhi. At times it is chaotic, at times it embraces me. It is a complicated place.

When I study English under the lens of grammar, I learn that a proper noun should start with a capital letter. Hence Delhi.”

Ifrah is a Literature and History student at Zakir Husain Delhi College, University of Delhi. She reads, writes, and paints when she is quiet.

02/06/2023

🔥 Part 3 of the Abouts and Doubts series by is out now on The Blahcksheep! It's called "Babies and Potatoes (Friends Getting Married).

🐑 Join Shubhshree on a roller-coaster journey through dysfunctional men, late night calls with girlfriends, work woes, and sexual cravings. Explore the tangled webs of marriage, tea, and gossip along the way. 💭

🔴 Shubhshree is a storyteller and design educator from Kota, Rajasthan, currently based in Bangalore. She combines visual and text together to give meaning to the mundane. With 8 years of industry experience encompassing research, branding, and writing, she aspires to create her own books one day.

👩‍💻 Read this awkwardly relatable series only on The Blahcksheep. Link in bio!

Illustration by Shubhshree 💜

01/06/2023

🔥 Ruh-E-Sukoon by Manpreet Bhamrah

Manpreet is a visual artist who brings life and her inner world onto canvas with her stylized abstract art and intricately detailed pencil work. Her artworks range from vibrant and expressive to introspective and melancholic, reflecting her constant exploration of identity and search for meaning. As a writer, she offers unique perspectives on artistic visions, capturing the essence of art exhibitions from both an artist’s and an art lover’s viewpoint.

31/05/2023

Ian McEwan is a novelist and screenwriter who’s known for his 2001 book Atonement. His restrained, refined prose style accentuates the horror of his dark humour and perverse subject matter.

In 2008, The Times featured him on its list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945" and The Daily Telegraph ranked him number 19 in its list of the "100 most powerful people in British culture".

Our Editor-in- Sheep recommends some of his all time greatest books. Swipe to read 🙌🏼 How many of these have you already read?