As I said elsewhere, Norm, well-done... and it goes kind of inversely with the picture.

Here's one from Carlsbad's beach today...

Sea Gullets

soaring pelicans
are San Diego's aireborne;
so much more pleasant
diving in the sea for prey
than Wildwood's pizza-vultures

- djr 11 May 2007

Spring Fling

Our Lady has graced
us with a perfect tanka;
her summer simmers
but spring has hardly begun
and teachers want to get off!
 
© MLee Dickens'son 30 April 2007

network down

synapse crash again
amid a blossoming thought;
it drifts fragmented
to dissipate in petals
floating into the unknown

© MLee Dickens’son 30 April 2007

An extension of haiku which adds to the topic while maintaining respect of form and function.  Tankas can be used when you want to say more than the haiku form allows you to.  I was in a frenzy of spring blooms when I wrote this tanka about my lilacs.

lilacs

smacking french doubles
bouquets for the nose and eyes
in a tour de force 
upstaged by rich purple blooms
encamped out by the garage

PFA
2/04/04

a wonderful snapshot of a rekindling flame, Norm!

Here's one I scribbled out [ or should I say created? ] in church last month:

All from Nothing

In the beginning
God made all out of nothing
~ the heavens and Earth;
then Earth was formless, empty,
darkness covering the deep.

His Spirit hovered
over the waters… then God
by His Word brought forth the Light
proclaiming, The Light is good,
separated from darkness.

© Daniel J Ricketts 21 Feb 2004
from Genesis 1

Tanka is a Japanese form of poetry of 31 onji; the closest we Americans come to that is to think in terms of 31 syllables.  In Japanese, tanka is often written in one straight line, but in English and other languages, we usually divide the lines into the five syllabic units: 
5-7-5-7-7 (or LESS)... since once that pattern is learned, the lines generally tend to be shorter to more approximate Japanese tradition.

Simply stated, tanka is a five-line poem capturing a single moment with a kind of emotional truth that is vivid, precise, concise.  It is written with concrete images, avoiding abstractions [ though I sometimes use abstractions in this form for fun or illustration... or in a response poem ]. The form is an opportunity to focus evocatively on a moment of your life and leave it as a reminder in print of the insightful experience.  

You may just find tanka exhilarating in a way that could kindle anew your appreciation of poetry in general!

I'm told that the earlier tanka shifted rhythm after the 12th onji; the more modern ones de-emphasize the location of shift or switch after the 17th.  Some today simply make the third line a 'pivot', interacting with both the first two and last two lines separately, creating two poems within the poem.   There is much freedom in the modern form, so...

at any rate, here are some of my own old and more recent attempts, for whatever they may be worth:

stumbling

stumbling into growth
becomes bloody painful stuff
scars remind
new vulnerability
to open my heart to love

© MLee Dickens'son 05 July 2002
modified 22 Sep 2008

<sub>original:

Stumbling into growth
may be bloody painful stuff,
but scars remind me
this vulnerability
opens my heart to loving.</sub>


Jesus' Earthy Dad

kept her a virgin
miraculous conception
of Mary’s Joseph
whose union was further blessed:
four sons and unnamed daughters

© Daniel J Ricketts 12 Dec 2003
- Matthew 1:25; Mark 6:3


annuals vs. perennial

‘lovers’ seek to come
seasoned and with wild bouquet
pretending to root;
a love is but one… who blooms
when planted in nurtured ground

© Daniel J Ricketts 18 Dec 2003

mud flats

my bristling appears 
as stubble filling space 
in shallow wetlands
what joy to drink with some
who wade through my mud flats

_{© MLee Dickens'son 20 Jan 2007}

oh o moment 

haijin rises but lies 
back down... for the rest 
awakened by rain 
in warm oh o moment
finds diuretic working 

_{© MLee Dickens'son 16 Jan 2008}