hosts: Firdaus Parvez, Kala Ramesh, Priti Aisola & Suraja Menon Roychowdhury
Introducing a new perspective to our Wednesday Feature! artist of the month: Prakash Thombre
18th December 2024
Prakash Thombre's experimental illustration in ink.
Prakash Thombre says: The Waiting…a timeless limbo where anticipation and uncertainty intertwine, holding hopes and dreams suspended
The challenge for this week:
Isn't life about waiting... waiting for things to happen or not to happen?
The waiting can kill us at times.
Give this idea some thought and share your tanka and tanka-prose here. Keep your senses open, observe things that happen around you, and write!
You can post tanka and tanka-prose outside this theme too.
An essay on how to write tanka: Tanka Flights
PLEASE NOTE: 1. Post only one poem at a time. 2. Only two tanka and two tanka-prose per poet per prompt. Tanka art of course if you want to.
3. Share your best-polished pieces.
4. Please do not post something in a hurry or something you have just written.
Let it simmer for a while.
5. Post your final edited version on top of your original verse.
6. Don't forget to give feedback on others' poems.
We are delighted to open the comment thread for you to share your unpublished tanka and tanka-prose (within 300 words) to be considered for inclusion in the haikuKATHA monthly magazine.
#1
Feedback welcome
Midnight Raga
It's past midnight and I've tentatively turned the lights off, as I wait for her. She and I have a stormy relationship. I fight her, until she subdues me. Or I chase her and she eludes me. Sometimes she gives in, but then gets her revenge a short while later, in the deep of the night when she vanishes, leaving me wide-eyed, counting the stars and the sheep and my breaths and wondering why the owl hoots in twos ...
what do I know
of dreams and such
elusive things
long ago I sang a song
I never learned its ending
Post 1
the house lizard
trapped between a dustpan
and a broom ...
its moment of freefall as i
toss it out of the window
Unsure of this one. Feedback is welcome.
Priti Aisola, India
Thanks, Suraja:
it’s the door
that's always half shut
this recurrent dream
holds so much of me
yet to be discovered
Kala Ramesh
***
it’s the door
to my childhood
this recurrent dream holds so much of me
yet to be accounted for
Kala Ramesh #2
Feedback most welcome.
23/12/24 #2 t-p
Held in Passing
My father weaves through the rain-soaked street, shoulders hunched against the wind, empty hands reaching for balance. At the curb, he hesitates. His breath unravels in the cold air. Between each faltering step, something wells up, spilling over, unspoken. A gust lifts a single leaf, carrying it beyond his reach.
dimming light
the rhythm of rain
on stone—
a robin stirs
then stills again
C.X. Turner, UK
(feedback welcome)
#2. 23/12/24
1st revision: Thanks Luci and Susan
Driven to the edge?
Wait at the signal
Wait for the wound to heal
Wait for the pain to subside
Wait for peace to return
Wait to reach home
Wait for the food to get cooked
Wait for the test results
Wait for our salaries
Wait for love, empathy…
In the end, even wait for death
the yearning
for a timely rain
clouds darken
as a farmer slides
deeper into debt
Sumitra Kumar
India
Feedback welcome
23/12/24. Tanka Prose
Driven to the edge?
When there is no choice
Waiting can frustrate
Waiting is non-negotiable
Waiting is life
We have to wait even if we wish to move on
Wait at the signal