Saghi Ghahraman

Saghi Ghahraman fled her native Iran after being arrested for working with a communist organization's women's branch. She has been living in exile in Canada for two decades, and is devoted to providing a voice for the Iranian gay, lesbian, and Transsexual community. To this end, she co-founded the IRQO (Iranian Queer Organization) and acts as the president of the organization. She chief-edited Cheraq (www.cheraq.org),IRQO's online monthly magazine. She coordinates Gilgamishaan Publications. Saghi Ghahraman's Farsi Publication include The Whore is the Saviour; Of Lies; Saghi Ghahraman. That's All; And When You Are Lonely, It Is Painful to Be Cow. Her English works have appeared in Amnesty International's 2000 Collection of Poetry, Diaspora Dialogue's TOK, and the Calgary-based quarterly The Filling Station. In addition to her print work, Ms. Ghahraman publishes a weblog. Saghi Ghahraman's poetry strips the words to liberate sexuality that lies beneath, and to celebrate an unveiled body free to choose how to identify self. She attempts to de-stigmatize terms of a sexual nature through her writing; by letting in words previously banned in Farsi literature, she redefines their connotations, puts them in a truer light. Before bounding to lead IRQO, from it's base in Toronto, Saghi Ghahraman traveled extensively, reading in Farsi and in English at various poetry readings and panels. She has also been a visiting editor at Descant (through the PEN Writers in Exile program) and a writer-in-residence at the Owen Sound Public Library. She showed her Collection of Photos in 401 Gallery, Richmond Toronto, and Da Last Studio Chicago.