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⭐ Hammad Rind ⭐ Fazal Baloch

Color photo of Hammad Rind, smiling into the camera

Black and white photo of Fazal Baloch, looking away from the camera

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⭐ Rishabh Pandit ⭐ Gaya Nagahawatta

Color photo of Rishabh Pandit smiling into the camera, behind him what appears to be a tree trunk

Color photo of Gaya Nagahawatta, looking away from the camera, smiling

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⭐ Eratfa Bintay Redwan ⭐ Deepa Bhasthi

Color photo of Eratfa Bintay Redwan, sitting and smiling into the camera

Color photo of Deepa Bhasthi standing with a bookshelf on her right, smiling into the camera

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

We are thrilled to introduce our brilliant lineup of speakers for the upcoming event on September 20th! Get tickets for “Voices Across Borders: Who Gets Represented?” here: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/voices-acr...

Poster for panelists and chair for the virtual event titled Voices Across Borders: Who Gets Represented? The poster is read, and there are 6 photos on it.

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Read 'God Story' by Irta Usman, about Awais Bhai who lives in a Lahore divided into the North and the South, and his love for the city. This story appears in Issue Eight – The Climate & Hunger Issue. lakeermag.com/irta-usman-g...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Hammad Rind, writer, translator, and the translation editor at Lakeer, talks about the upcoming event "Voices Across Borders: Who Gets Represented?". Here, he speaks about the continued importance of working with South Asian languages. * Tickets: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/voices-acr...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

In September, National Translation Month, join Lakeer in its virtual event "Voices Across Borders: Who Gets Represented?" about translating from underrepresented South Asian languages. 🗓️Sunday, September 20 ⏲️6 PM PKT (9 AM EST) 📌Online Tickets: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/voices-acr...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

We're thrilled that Lakeer is the proud recipient of a 2026 PEN Translates x SALT Grant. Lakeer has published over 60 translations, in Urdu, Punjabi, Gujrati, Welsh, Tamil and Sinhala. With support from PEN Translates x SALT Chicago, we're set to hold our first event next month!

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Iman Ahmed and Dur e Aziz Amna speak about how their work resists conformity and forces difficult confrontations. On the cover is Iman Ahmed's beautiful artwork, which takes the subject matter of heirlooms and all that they've witnessed.

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Malaika Rai and Umayr Aamir work with poems heavy with imagery. Qamar Abbas Araji, Eisha Tur Raazia and Mahin Wahla reckon with different hungers. Shadab Zeest Hashmi and Sakina Hassan write about existing in a time of gross injustices.

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Ali Akbar Natiq, Ali Baluch, Muhammad Khuzaima Nizami and Zainab Jokhio write about landscapes being forced to undergo change at the cost of losing precious living things. Irta Usman, Wania Aijaz, Zuhaa Fayyaz Qureshi and Fatima Jafar look at places through the people living there.

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

🎉 THE LATEST ISSUE OF LAKEER MAGAZINE IS HERE! ISSUE EIGHT, SUMMER 2026 SPECIAL - THE CLIMATE & HUNGER ISSUE! In it is a landscape of related, overlapping concerns: human-made climate catastrophes; questions about injustice and pushbacks on violence. Read here: lakeermag.com/issue-eight

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Sarah Ahmad's art, 'Landscapes of Imagining, II', appears in Issue Seven. Sarah lives and works between Tulsa, Oklahoma and Lahore, Pakistan. At the core of her work is transformation...and renewal, just as the earth continually seeks to heal itself. www.sarahahmad.com

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

'Solitudes' by Raja'a Khalid is a short story about two sisters, different in temperament to each other. Circumstances take them far from home, where, away from the usual distractions, each sister discovers something about herself. Read the full story in Issue Seven: lakeermag.com/rajaa-khalid...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

Poetic Renditions' Column 3, by Amama Bashir, features Jaun Elia's poem ہمیشہ قتل ہو جاتا ہوں میں 'Hamesha Qatal Hojata Huun Mein', translated by Javeria Hasnain, Shandana Minhas, Yusra Amjad, and Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi. lakeermag.com/prcolumn3-2/

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This year, Lakeer's Summer Mentorship Program is joined by two more incredible writers as mentors: 🌟 POETRY 🟣 FATIMA JAFAR 🌟 FICTION 🟣 HASSAAN MIRZA

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Announcing our poetry cohort for the Lakeer Summer Mentorship Program! 🌟 POETRY Ayesha Owais Zainab Khalid Eesha Hammad Shahzadi Fatima Malalai Noor Khan Mentored by Fatima Jafar and Aiman Tahir Khan. Congratulations to the participants!

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Announcing our cohort for Food Writing and Translation, for Lakeer Summer Mentorship Program! 🌟 FOOD WRITING Zainab Saeed 🌟 TRANSLATION Konain Fatima Congratulations to the selected participants!

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

We are so excited to announce our cohort for the Lakeer Summer Mentorship Program! 🌟 FICTION Abdul Kabir Sara Ilyas Eman Farhan 🌟 SPECULATIVE FICTION Jalal Tarar Saamia Haq 🌟 CREATIVE NONFICTION Anees Ur Rehman Huda Lakhani Naaseh Sajid Congratulations!

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Listen to Iqra Shagufta Cheema's translation from Urdu of Zehra Nigah's poem 'Mother, I Survived'. The moving translation and reading by Iqra are included in Issue Seven of Lakeer Magazine: lakeermag.com/zehra-nigah-...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

In our latest issue, Rabia Malik speaks with Tayyba Maya Kanwal about Tayyba's debut short-story collection 'Talking with Boys' (Black Lawrence Press, 2026). The stories take place in the US, the UAE, and Pakistan. Read the full interview here: lakeermag.com/tayyba-maya-...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

There is movement and transformation in Ayesha Owais's poem, 'A poem where the dog comes back as a fish'. Read it in full in Issue Seven of Lakeer Magazine: lakeermag.com/ayesha-owais...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

Lakeer is a nonprofit literary publication, dedicated to creative voices from Pakistan and its diaspora. We depend on donations to pay our writers, and to keep our platform alive. To support work that matters, please donate today at the link in our bio.

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⭐️ Poetry: Aiman Tahir Khan is a poet and translator from Lahore, Pakistan. Her work appears in The Colorado Review, The Rumpus, Shō Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. She is currently working on a chapbook and tends to the solitary magpie-robin that visits her lawn now and then.

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⭐️ Speculative Fiction: Rabia Malik, a writer and educator from Lahore. Her work has appeared in The Aleph Review, The RIC Journal, The News on Sunday, and other places. She is an editor for Lakeer's column Chowk. She currently teaches at BNU.

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⭐️ Speculative Fiction: Hamza Sarfraz, a science fiction and culture writer who focuses on cities and cybernetics. His works have been published in Tasavvur, Dawn, NORRAG, and syndicated in The Print and Scroll.

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⭐️ Fiction: Anum Asi, whose work has been published in Virginia Quarterly Review, The Aleph Review, Indiana Review, and elsewhere, and been supported by the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Cornell University, among ohers. She's won the Emily Clark Balch Prize for Fiction.

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⭐️ Fiction: Bareerah Y Ghani, a Pakistani writer and editor, based in Northern Virginia. Her work has appeared in The Rumpus, Electric Literature, and other places. She is currently working on a novel, exploring displacement and belonging in postcolonial Karachi, Pakistan.

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⭐️ Creative Nonfiction: Omair Danish, an archivist, photographer, researcher/writer, and nonfiction editor at Lakeer, currently pursuing an MA in Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle. More about him on Instagram @cubisticromeos.

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⭐️ Creative Nonfiction: Farah Ali, writer of the novels Telegraphy and The River, The Town, and the short-story collection People Want to Live. Her work has been anthologized in the Pushcart Prize and Best Small Fictions. She is the cofounder of Lakeer, and an editor at Wasafiri.

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⭐️ Translation: Hammad Rind, a Pakistani-born writer and translator based in Cardiff. He is the author of Four Dervishes and Panchven Darvesh ka Qissa. His translations include Uljha Gham, and Nodiadlyfr Bach y Wawr, co-translated with the poet Iestyn Tyne. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Welsh.

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⭐️ Food Writing: Duaa Amir, a doctor and writer based in Karachi who writes about food and culture surrounding migrant identity. Her work has appeared in Dawn Images, Geo Big Picture, Lakeer, and Poorvanchal and Palayan. She was a South Asia Speaks 2022 Fellow.

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

⭐️ The Lakeer Summer Mentorship Program 2026 offers mentorship across a range of categories. ⭐️ Applications close on 18 May. ⭐️ The program is free, and online. ⭐️ Guidelines at: lakeermag.com/mentorship

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Bareerah Ghani talks to Daniyal Mueenuddin, author of the novel 'This Is Where the Serpent Lives' (Knopf, 2026). They speak about power, servitude, and the manifestations of these in the characters in the novel. Read the full interview in Issue Seven: lakeermag.com/daniyal-muee...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

Sri Lankan writer, educator, and theatre practitioner – and guest editor for Chapter Two of Avaaz – Gaya Nagahawatta brings to us five poems and a short story in Tamil and Sinhala, translated into Urdu and Shahpuri by Hammad Rind, and Majhi Punjabi by Rabia Malik. lakeermag.com/avaaz-sinhal...

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Lakeer @lakeermag.bsky.social · 25/04/2026

In her essay 'Beyond Gumnam Tareekh', Musfira Khurshid looks at archives that are texts and buildings, and pays special attention to the silences in them, showing us that there is more than one way we are always connected to the past. Read it in Issue Seven: lakeermag.com/musfira-khur...

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🌟 Rana Saadullah Khan is a writer from Lahore and Islamabad. His work has been published in Jamhoor, The Aleph Review, Dunya Digital, as well as through UNESCO Pakistan and the history education platform, Hashiya.

Black and white photo of Rana Saadullah Khan, standing in the courtyard of a masjid.

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🌟 Malaika Rai is a postgraduate in Clinical and Counseling Psychology based in Lahore. Her work dissects the visceral realities of female identity. She explores the body as both an offering and a battleground...unapologetic feminine rage.

Black and white photo of Malaika Rai, next to a tall plant

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📅 We can't wait to see everyone at Lakeer Kahaniyan Lahore! This will be an open-mic evening, with some of our contributors reading as well. ⏰ 15 Feb | 6pm 📍 The Last Word Bookstore, Lahore 9 A Main Blvd Gulberg، above Third Culture Coffee, Block K Gulberg 2, Lahore

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'The Marchers Have Reached the Capital' by Sakina Hassan, in Lakeer Magazine's Spring 2024 issue. Read the full poem here: lakeermag.com/the-marchers/

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📢 We are also accepting poetry for a special folio: poems with a visual art component. These can be: - Ekphrastic poems - Shape/Pattern poems - Poems in conversation with other art forms (painting, photography, sculpture, video, and architecture) 📢 Deadline: April 30 #lakeermagazine

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