Tanka Prose

Everywhere I look

Signs litter my world. Yet how little sinks in, how little I know. Dozens on the drive to town or, for that matter, anywhere else. Street and road signs, neighborhood notices, highway markers. Instructions, information, warnings. Round, square, rectangular, triangular, hexagonal, diamond- and pennant-shaped, and more. White, green, blue, yellow, orange, red. Blinking lights. Overload.

Private Property–No Trespassing. Speed Limit (and how the limits change along the way). East, West. Right Curve, Left Curve. Pass With Care, Do Not Pass. Don't Litter. Loose Gravel, High Water. Drive Friendly. Adopt A Highway. Church. Cemetery. Dead End. No Shoulder Ahead. . . . Stop, Stop, Stop.

HEARTBREAK

a sign I always see

when passing by

that small empty shack

at the end of the jetty

______________

—Contemporary Haibun Online, July 2016, vol 12, no. 2

The assortment

the assortment
of birthday cards
he gives me,
one from each side
of his personality

—red lights, 4:2; Take Five, vol. 1 (2008)

When you are gone

when you are gone
I eat on white melamine
same dishes
I’ve complained about before:
generic, expressionless

—Simply Haiku, Autumn 2005, Vol 3, No. 3

My first tanka. I wrote it and several more over a couple of days and then somehow got all but one of them accepted for publication three days later. (I'd probably edit a few of them a little differently now, but…) After that, I was hooked! 

Not sharing

not sharing

my passion for poetry

he buys me

Pablo Neruda’s 

Odes to Opposites

—Fire Pearls 2 (anthology by Keibooks), 2013

How deftly; in love; 20-some years

how deftly

you maneuver the chopsticks—

with fork in hand

I study your routine

as if you were a gymnast

—I think this was published (2007?), but I can't figure out where

in love

over vegetable curry
I can’t stop staring. . .
this brown rice
isn’t one bit mushy

—Simply Haiku, Autumn 2006

20-some years

of knowing each other

we choose mild

for the heat level

of our chana masala

—Fire Pearls 2 (an anthology by Keibooks), 2013

Refusing

refusing
to use a walker
or cane
she leans on me
for the first time in her life

Happy to win second place for English-language tanka in the 2014 San Francisco International Competition, conducted by the Haiku Poets of Northern California (HPNC). Poet/editor Michael McClintock was the tanka judge this time.

Her wedding ring

her wedding ring
found deep in red mud
………...that May day
when the tornado
tore through their heartland

Oklahoma, May 2013

—red lights, Vol. 10, No. 2, June 2014

A gift

a gift
of lion earrings
from the suitor
who kept insisting
I was a mouse

—red lights, Vol. 10, No. 1, January 2014

"Cartoon" haiga: to woo me

—haiga published in Prune Juice, issue 11, Nov. 2013

"to woo me" first published in Fire Pearls 2, 2013

artwork courtesy of friend Karen A. Smith

A thimble; from my mother

a thimble,
my Monopoly piece ...
and for years
the only metal thing
I wore on this finger

— cattails, premiere issue, January 2014

from my mother

the wisdom in saving

scraps of cloth ...

inevitable,

the patching to be done

— red lights, Vol. 10, No. 1, January 2014

The porch bench

the porch bench

dusted with pale yellow

this spring

our closeness breaks down

into a fine powder

—Fire Pearls 2 (anthology), 2013

Postage stamps

postage stamps

with LOVE swirled in red—

the mail clerk

asks if it's okay

to use them on my letters

—Fire Pearls 2, 2013

True story. She seemed to want to get rid of those stamps. So, yes, I allowed her to put them on my letters, and I bought a few additional ones to take home. I thought it was very considerate of her to ask, lol. Here's one:

And this marks the end of the second annual "Love Month" at twigs&stones.

One year; this small pendant

one year
an emerald ring
next, sapphire ...
before we parted
they were meadow and sea

this small pendant

I wear every day:

inside the heart

an open-winged dove

holding an olive branch

—both from Fire Pearls 2, 2013

As we listen

as we listen

to Bonnie Raitt’s blues

     somewhere between

finding her man and losing him

my husband’s hand touches mine

—Fire Pearls 2, 2013

He helped the artist design this pair of hippos on the couch by suggesting to the shopkeeper that hearts be added. The artist liked the idea!

Barely twelve

barely twelve,

apples profuse on our tree—

through the mail slot

he pushes love notes

for me to discover

—Fire Pearls 2, 2013

Bringing home

bringing home

his newborn daughter . . .

hands steady 

on the steering wheel

he takes the safest route

—Fire Pearls 2, 2013

Now she, my niece, is in college, where she's class secretary, continues to play violin, and is studying to be a teacher.

Love Month

This year's "Love Month" is about to begin at twigs&stones: both serious and not-so-serious tanka, most of them from the anthology Fire Pearls 2. 

The pictured plate is part of a set my kind husband bought (from Williams-Sonoma) sometime before we were married—supposedly for himself, hmm, yes, sure...!

P.S. Maybe you have a few "love" tanka or other small "love" poems you'd care to share, or poetic responses to mine? If so, please add them to a comments page (and, if you like, I also can formally post them later).

Our honeymoon; I tell him; an e-card

our honeymoon
spent choosing furniture
for our new home,
hopeful roots sprouting
from solid-wood legs

—Fire Pearls 2 (anthology), 2013

I tell him
it's his anniversary
he tells me
it's mine too—the comfort
in our seeming nonchalance

—bottle rockets 18, 2008; Take Five, Vol. 1, 2009

an e-card 
sent from his corner 
of the house 
our anniversary 
hiding in my spam 

—red lights, Vol. 9, No. 1, January 2013

Anyone who watches the Bachelor/Bachelorette on TV with his spouse should be given a medal. Yes, it's true.

Early blooms

early blooms
on the bridal wreath—
the many years
before I could picture
myself dressed in white

—Moonbathing, Issue 8, Spring/Summer 2013

I believe the early blooms appeared in late winter.

Ad Vitam Paramus (tanka prose)

I still can see my fingers pasting bits of dyed eggshell onto the pencil sketch in my notebook. The history teacher, Mr. H., had turned his nose up at my first depiction of the Bayeux Tapestry. I'm not yet eleven—am new to this school, new from America to this strange little country. I don't understand the point of immersing myself in studies of bloodthirsty conquests, brutal monarchs, black plagues, and the like. Or spending time on related artwork.

graffiti
etched onto old desks
by many hands—
how English becomes
a foreign language

Fresh from university, and one of the few men ever to set foot in our hallowed school, poor Mr. H. also was required to teach us long-dead Latin. Decades later, memories would surface, popping up as posts on Facebook walls. The way he stood errant students on desk chairs and hurled chalkboard erasers at them (threatening the most recalcitrant students with heavy textbooks). Yet how mere sightings of him, with his handsome, chiseled looks, immediately evoked giggles and whispers throughout the schoolhouse. And how one year, after the summer holidays, Mr. H. never returned. The story goes he ran off to New Zealand with a female teacher; the only detail that remains in question is which teacher that was.

schoolgirls
introduced to love,
amare,
the first Latin verb
we learn to conjugate

 Ad Vitam Paramus = We are preparing for life.

—Haibun Today, Volume 7, Number 1, March 2013