Ephemerae, a new journal of hakai, Volume 1A, April 2018 has just been published in the U.K. I am honored to have two tanka included in this first edition. Edited by Shrikaanth K. Murthy, there are over 160 fine poets included from around the world.
returning again
to the faded notes
scribbled in margins
I search for traces
of who you really were
…
reflected
in a bookshop window
sun glinting behind
your image imposed
over mine
Both tanka (c) 2018 Mary Kendall
Skylark Tanka Journal 6:1, Summer 2018:
Two tanka
old walking stick—
once it was
a branch
that stretched
to the sky
. . .
all those years spent
twisted in shame –
cultivating old world roses
but still ignoring
the thorns
A beautiful walking stick made in the traditional manner.
Prune Juice, Journal of Senryu, Kyoka, Haibun & Haiga, Issue, 24, Spring 2018:
two senryu and one kyoka published
pulling a single
strand of silken thread …
her undoing
…
sipping skinny lattés
they march against
world hunger
…
a slight limp
on cold and rainy days
how easy it is
to fall out of step
with myself
Orb Weaver Web / Photo by Robert Potts/Getty Images
This tanka was published in Skylark, a Tanka Journal, Volume 5, Issue 2, Winter 2017:
The following tanka is dedicated to the courageous people who participated in the “Moral Mondays” in my home state of North Carolina. They risked arrest for gathering at the State Legislature to protest unfair and discriminatory legislation being passed. These protests were non-violent and led by the Reverend William J. Barber.
Moral Monday –
arm and arm linked
you choose to step
into the darkness
to find the light
This Haiga was published in Failed Haiku: A Journal of English Senryu, October 2017.
faded numbers
tattooed on your arm
I slip back in silence
.
~Mary Kendall~
Published in Presence 58 July 2017
.
.
Back story on this tanka. In 1972 I visited friends in Israel. As a tourist, I was eager to see the historical sites, one of which was Masada, site of a group suicide where a Jewish community was surrounded by Roman soldiers. The Jews chose suicide rather than be taken as captives. As I stood high up on the hilly site with other visitors, it was very, very quiet. It was after all a sacred place. An older man stood next to me, and I happened to glance at him also looking out at where the soldiers would have been waiting, hoping to starve out the isolated Jewish community. I noticed on his arm, faded numbers–numbers, of course, indicating he’d been captive in a Concentration Camp. The poignancy of him being there has stayed with me for over forty years. Never again, please Lord, shall we do such things to our fellow men.
Both pictures are from travel sites to and in Israel. Masada is located in the Judean desert, very close to the Dead Sea. Visiting these sites is like stepping back two thousand years. I am so grateful for having had this opportunity to visit.
