Anthem In 2018, Tran, aged 22, and Justice Gaines, aged 23, opened for
Kit Yan in the show
Queer Heartache, which impressed artistic producer Mark Lunsford, who saw their potential to carry their own show. In 2019, Tran and Gaines were hired to star in and produce a spoken word show by the
American Repertory Theater at the Oberon in
Cambridge, Massachusetts. Together they created and headlined,
Anthem, a show dedicated to humanizing transgender women in the arts and generally.
WBUR called Tran and Gaines, "two of the most recognized trans poets of color on the local and national poetry scene". Tran and Ameer invited other artists, nearly all who identify as trans, queer, or non-binary, to join
Anthem'
s performances. The collaboration was an effort to give back to the LGBTQ community and to incorporate more than two transgender perspectives.
Commentary on Stonewall Tran has written pieces on the
Stonewall Uprising for
them and
The Nation, and has commented on Stonewall for a
New York Times video. Tran argues that when Stonewall is discussed, the "lifelong
care work of organizing and activism" of those involved is typically erased, especially the efforts of transgender women like
Marsha P. Johnson,
Sylvia Rivera, and
Miss Major Griffin Gracy.
Mural In 2017, Brooklyn-based artist, poet, and filmmaker,
Jess X Snow, painted a mural of Tran, in
Rochester, New York at the annual WALL\THERAPY muralism festival. The 2017 festival prompt was to paint the best group or person improving the community. Snow and Tran attended Brown University together and later attended
Rachel McKibbens' poetry retreat for women of color, The Pink Door, in 2016. The mural featured a quote from Tran's poem "Biological Woman", "''I transcend biology / I'm supernova / an extraterrestrial gender / I drink all the water on Mars & rename that my blood''." Snow said, "The magic of her words in the face of transphobia and misogyny is what directly inspired the mural."
Poetry competitions By winning local grand slams, Tran earned herself spots at Rustbelt Regional Poetry Slam, Feminine Empowerment Movement Slam (FEMS), Women of the World Poetry Slam (WoWPS), National Poetry Slam (NPS), and College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI)—more than once for the latter three competitions. She has performed on the final stages of Rustbelt and FEMS once, on teams that won the competitions. She's performed on the final stage of WoWPS twice, and has made it to the semi-finals at NPS twice and CUPSI three times. == Works ==