Fragments from trois fois rien (Éditions Blast, September 2026).

Translated from French by Eponine Howarth.

I never understood
what it means
to blow categories apart

the people who say
we must destroy gender

& where do you plant your bomb
when you want to destroy gender

gender is in our heads
it’s in our practices

it’s far too pervasive
too gaseous & fluid
for us to pin down

as for me I don’t want
it to be destroyed

gender is incredibly beautiful
an amazing playground

what’s complicated
are the orders the norms

the assumption that genders
belong to people

***

I don’t like defining myself
I don’t like categories

I’m too afraid of being reduced
to femininity in particular

I don’t even say I’m non-binary
because it puts images
in people’s heads

***

queer is the easiest
way to avoid over-defining yourself
in the heterosexual world
they don’t understand
if it means
you’re a lesbian
or trans

***

for a long time I didn’t want to give up the pronoun she
giving it up meant yielding to the masculine deserting the
feminine

like the butch & bodybuilding Sino-American poet
kitty tsui I would proclaim don’t call me sir call
me strong

the choice seemed simple to me between sir or
strong if I had to choose between transitioning or
shining if the corollary of transitions is inevitably
to lose one’s power

what sort of dead end would I have thrown myself into
what sort of grief would have weighed me down?

we are losing our warriors
our immense women

that too is the lesbian legacy
a fictional point of no return

***

as a teenager I dreamt of going far away
but going far away means

taking the risk that people might die
that people might no longer be there when you return

at eighteen
I left
I didn’t go far
the nearest big city

it’s like
cutting a hole in the wire fence
getting out of the enclosure but with the rope
still round my neck

as a teenager I didn’t just dream
of going far away but of disappearing
shedding my skin

***

at what point
do people snap
raise their voices

in front of their parents
without fearing the consequences

I feel
as though I can’t transition
without parental permission

I’m turning thirty
after all

locked into the persona
of the eternal adolescent
I hear

in my mother’s voice
that she has never
stepped out of her role

she keeps asking me
if I’ve filed my tax return

I keep benefiting
from her foresight

***

there are two kinds of writers
those who write every day
& those who don’t
I’m a writer who doesn’t write

I think of writing
every day
I warm up
get myself fired up

it’s like preparing for a marathon
by staying in bed & visualising the race

it’s like preparing for a marathon
by watching YouTube videos
of people running

kate zambreno says that reading is writing, taking notes
is writing, watching films is writing

as if writing preceded the act
& was already lodged in the intention

outside the sun releases the white fluff
trapped in the pine needles

opens moving windows
that sweep across the snow-covered railings
& the jade-coloured slopes
‍