Re: TANKA POETRY - for improving our skills at writing tanka... ;)

[Doctor Fab]

Thanks Lidia,

However, since this is an invitation to discuss our way to write tanka, so as to improve our skills, we need to share our poetry with the others.

The 2 parts of your tanka (upper and lower poem) are well juxtaposed:

now is the time to / change this unfeeling world /  into loving one
or the world to change your soul / into a wandering wolf

but it needs a few changes.  — My suggestion:

now is the time
to change this harsh world into
a loving one
or the world will change your soul
into a wandering wolf

F.

On Wed, Dec 8, 2021 at 5:50 PM Lidia Hristeva <lydchr...@gmail.com> wrote:

Here is my first attempt

now is the time to

change this unfeeling world

into loving one

or the world to change your soul

into a wandering wolf

Lidia

On Wed, 8 Dec 2021 at 16:03, Doctor Fab <docto...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello All,

as we did more than two months ago, for our TANKA anthology project, I wish to stimulate your poetic creativity by asking you to compose up to 5 tanka using the following five suggestions:

1. it changes color

2. now is the time

3. at the station

4. inside a mirror

5.  the east wind

They come from the following tanka  — you remember the "kami-no-ku" (upper poem: the first 3 lines) and the "shimo-no-ku" (lower poem: the last 2 lines)? 🙂

1.

how invisibly
it changes color
in this world,

the flower
of the human heart

— Ono no Komachi (825–900), translation by Jane Hirshfield.

2.

now is the time
you think to leave me,
I'm growing older  —

your promises too
are leaves of turning colors

— Ono no Komachi

3.

our life in this world
is like the image one sees
inside a mirror —

something that's not really there,
but then not really not-there

— Minamoto no Sanetomo (1192–1219), translated by Steven D. Carter.

4.

at the train station
my wife came with our daughter
on her back

I caught sight of her eyebrows
through a blanket of snow

—  Ishikawa Takuboku (1886–1912), translated by Roger Pulvers.

5.

her loose hair entwined
around a young branch
by the east wind...

and in the west a rainbow
so small, yet radiant!

—  Yosano Akiko (1878–1942), translated by Roger Pulvers.

In addition, for those who feel more "intrepid" 😎 I propose a more demanding challenge: although the following three poems are not tanka (they are haiku), what about trying to use them as if they were the "kami-no-ku" (upper poem) of a tanka? 

Of course, haiku is not a shortened tanka, nor is tanka a prolonged haiku, but it may be interesting to see how these 3 haiku can be transformed into tanka by adding a proper "shimo-no-ku" (the lower poem, made of 2 lines) to them 😇

H.1.:

envied by us
they turn beautiful then fall —
autumn leaves

— Kagami Shiko (1665 – 1731)

[or, as in another translation of the original Japanese text:

" envied by us all / turning to such loveliness / red leaves that fall "]

H.2.:

a lone
frosty rose —
new year

— Shūōshi Mizuhara (1892–1981)

H.3.:

first snow —
begins in the darkness
ends in the darkness

— Nozawa Setsuko (1920–1995)

Who feels like trying? 🙂

Cheers

F.

🎄

[Doctor Fab]

so far only three friends have submitted their entries (see below). Their 4 tanka will be in the anthology.

Anyone else want to try? 😎

Come on.. don't be shy! 😜😁

Best

F.

🎄

________________________

Lidia:

1.

now is the time

to change this harsh world into

a loving one

or the world will change your soul

into a wandering wolf

2.

this sadness of mine...

such human heart’s enemy

changes its colour

never comes in white only

some days it is black emptiness

Geeta:

a chameleon —

its changing colours from grey

to green pink red...

ah, volatile emotions

of the human heart!

Annette:

her hello

smothers my goodbye

at the station —

arrival and departure

of two trains on the same track

Annette also tried to make a tanka out of a haiku... and it worked 🙂 :

a lone
frosty rose —
new year

photos in the calendar
of last summer's rose garden