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

Translated from French by Eponine Howarth.

I've 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
‍