Thursday, January 01, 2026

TANKA Published 2025

 Ribbons (journal of the Tanka Society of America)

21.1, spring/summer 2025


        expecting
        a bumper crop
        of zucchini
        I make a list of neighbors
        who gift Xmas fruitcake


21.2, fall/winter 2025

        a loon calls
        as thunderheads move in
        Dad steadies
        the boat with both oars
        for my last overhand cast


Onions in Moonlight
(2025 Tanka Society of America Members' Anthology)

        dry thistles
        chatter in the wind
        remembering
        our last conversation,
        what we let unsaid


haikuKATHA


#40, February 2025

        reading
        your goodbye letter . . .
        the time
        it takes a single cloud
        to drift across the lake

 

        the hour
        between birdsong
        and sunrise
                just me and this monkey-mind
               pretending to meditate


#41, March 2025

        enough rain
        to rinse the windowsills
        but not to lift
                    these memories
                    this yearning

 
        fresh powder        
        as dawn sneaks its way
        through the chill
        roadrunner tracks stitching
                       shadows together


#42 April 2025

 

        from this pass
        overlooking Las Vegas
               the new moon
               lost in an arched swath
               of star-blistered sky


        in that lapse
        between moonset and sunrise
                      the muse arrives
                      in her pink bunny slippers
                      uncaffeinated, hair wild

 

        his face dims
        with each passing year
        . . . and still
        that rich baritone voice
        sings in my midnight mind

 

 #44, June 2025

        counting stars . . .
        wondering, wondering how
        a trillion neutrinos
        just passed through me
        without an ouch

 

#45, July 2025

        morning sun
        and the auburn notes
        in your dark hair. . .
        a wallet-worn snapshot
        of us among the lilacs


48, October 2025


        after the storm
        this pink-cheeked dawn . . .
        hopeful
        as a nest of smiling
        matryoshkas




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