Tag Archives: tanka

by Luanne | April 4, 2023 · 12:40 pm

Spring Walk: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested this prompt today: to write a shadorma using 3-5 selected words. Syllable count is 3-5-3-3-7-5. I think I used 8 of the words, but I am writing the poem on my iPad in this post so I can’t go over the word list again.

Spring Walk

This spring month,

not yet hot, cloudy

over rocks

and bushes,

I walk with a book and grapes

and wish spring to last.

I hope you enjoyed that, especially knowing how hot it will get here in Arizona by mid-May. I am lying on my back with this iPad because I am resting my legs. For over ten weeks my right leg has been a monster. Saturday I had an MRI, but I’ve had other tests with no diagnosis or idea of what’s wrong. So why did I write about walking? For one thing, it’s a word on the list. But I can and do like to do light walking with the leg issue. But then I have to rest it. And the leg prefers very limited sitting (at the computer).

Serena Agusto-Cox on Savvy Verse & Wit has written a great review for my Red Riding Hood chapbook Our Wolves: https://savvyverseandwit.com/2023/04/our-wolves-by-luanne-castle.html She argues that the poems are not retellings of Red Riding Hood. Read her review to see what she says they are.

person in red coat in grassfield — Photo by Hebert Santos on Pexels.com

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Filed under #amwriting, #TankaTuesday, Arizona, Book Review, Our Wolves, Poetry, Writing, Writing prompt

Tagged as #amwriting, #OurWolves, #TankaTuesday, Arizona, book review, Poetry, spring, syllabic poetry, tanka, Writing prompt

by Luanne | March 29, 2023 · 9:23 am

Desert Mountain Landscape: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested this prompt today: to write a syllabic poem about what you see out of your window.

The gardener and I were driving on the freeway in western Arizona yesterday, and I saw something unusual: two sheep were picking their way down the mountainside out in the “middle of nowhere.” So I wrote a tanka in the car.

My tanka topic is Scene Through a Car Window:

A hawk flies above

saguaro-studded mountains

in yellow blossom

as two bighorn sheep descend,

their coronas glinting light.

green cactus plants on mountain — Photo by Justin Nealey on Pexels.com

This image at Pexels looks very similar to where I saw the sheep except that they were walking down a fairly steep mountain. And right now the brittlebush is in full bright yellow bloom. At first I thought they were goats because they were so graceful and agile amidst the shrub and rocks. But their large curved horns seem to indicate that they were bighorn sheep (although slender for bighorns).

I read another review for my Red Riding Hood chapbook Our Wolves: https://abookishwayoflife.blogspot.com/2023/03/our-wolves-by-luanne-castle.html?fbclid=IwAR0XL2jnDa_2NyGcAFdKXUCgjcWr8zJl0LWwxtuvRP17kV98y6CBZyekO2E

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Filed under #amwriting, #TankaTuesday, Arizona, Book Review, Cats and Other Animals, Poetry, Writing, Writing prompt

Tagged as #amwriting, #TankaTuesday, Arizona mountains, bighorn sheep, Poetry, syllabic poetry, tanka, Writing prompt

by Luanne | March 14, 2023 · 2:01 pm

Two Springs in Arizona: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested this prompt today: write a syllabic poem using synonyms for the words green and spring, but do not use those words themselves. I decided to use the form tanka because I am starting to really appreciate that structure.

Rather than a title, a tanka might have a topic. My topic is Arizona seasons.

March in the desert
is verdant, a vernal gem,
budtime under blue
and blossomy without freeze,
Phoenix repeats in the fall.

Vernal and budtime are both synonyms for spring. Verdant is a synonym for green.

In Arizona we tend to have two springs, meaning that some blossoming trees bloom twice a year and that we plant new annuals in both fall and spring. For this reason March and April—and October—are my favorite months in Arizona.