Sea birds ride the thermals

.

A tanka published in
Gusts No. 40, Contemporary Tanka, Canada,
fall/winter 2024  

sea birds
ride the thermals
beyond steep chalk cliffs—
I wonder what they hear
in the swirling wind

Shape-shifting in my dream

shape-shifting
in my dream, I leap
and run with graceful gazelles
able now to outpace
all that awaits

.

.

A tanka published in
Gusts No. 40, Contemporary Tanka, Canada,
Fall/winter 2024  

Image by xi Serge from Pixabay

The last plum blossom, etc. (a mix of tanka and haiku)

The lovely New Zealand journal, Kokaku, published two haiku and two tanka in their fall issue: Kokaku #37, 2022.

Kokaku #37,  2022

evening web –
the last plum blossom
caught fast

       ***

corner flower shop –
if only our lives were
arranged so well

       ***

quick twists and turns
of rutting deer ~
another season passes
adrift in colours
of passion and promise

       ***

This tanka appeared on my blog last month but was from this issue (37):

a tiny fawn dead
by the side of the road –
I close my eyes & imagine
all those children lost
in Ukraine strikes

 

       ***

 

A tiny fawn, dead… (Ukraine tanka)

Published in Kokaku, Summer/Fall 2022

~

a tiny fawn dead
by the side of the road –
I close my eyes & imagine
all those children lost
in Ukraine strikes

~

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Image by meineresterampe from Pixabay

Which way? (tanka)

~

having made it
halfway across, halfway back
I stop and pause
wondering which way
I really want to go

~

Published in Eucalypt 32 Tanka,  May 2022 Issue

~

Screen Shot 2022-10-18 at 5.27.13 PM

Tight-Rope Walker by Jean Louis Forain, c. 1885, Art Institute of Chicago

This tanka was inspired by a painting of a tightrope walker:
Tight Rope Walker by Jean Louis Forain, The Art Institute of Chicago

~

So many bodies in Bucha…

 

This is the first of two tanka published in:

 

Gusts No. 36 Contemporary Tanka  
fall/winter 2022

 

 

 

so many bodies in Bucha,
even more mass graves
are dug and quickly filled
. . . no mourners, no prayers
at the gravesite today

 

 

 

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