TANKA TAKE HOME — 26th November '25 Featuring poet: Reid Hepworth

hosts: Firdaus Parvez, Kala Ramesh, Priti Aisola & Suraja Menon Roychowdhury

Introducing a new perspective to our  Wednesday Feature!

26th November, 2025

poet of the month: Reid Hepworth

Reid, we thank you warmly for sharing your poems and for your thoughtful responses to our questions.

More about the poet:

Background:

Reid Hepworth has been enamoured with words and storytelling since childhood. Even though being a writer was a lifelong goal, she didn’t start writing haikai poetry until late 2021. Once she started on the haikai path, she couldn’t stop. 

Since then Reid has been nominated multiple times for the Pushcart Prize and the Touchstone Awards. She has published a book with Adisakrit Publishing - loss is a river (2024) and her second book again with Adisakrit Publication, the improbability of sea monkeys (is upcoming) 2025. Her work appears in journals and anthologies worldwide. Reid is the current associate editor at Drifting Sands Haibun and a past associate editor of The Haibun Gallery at Triveni Haiku India. 

Reid spent most of her life on the West Coast of British Columbia, Canada and now splits her time between Georgian Bay, Ontario and Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. 

***

Thanks for answering all our questions, Reid. I'm sure our members have got to know you better now.

5. 

TTH: Can you give any advice to someone wanting to write and publish tanka? As an editor what are you looking for in a tanka that makes it most likely to get published? 

RH: 

Read, read, read. I can’t stress this enough. Allow yourself to be exposed to new and emerging writers, historical writers, experimental work, etc. Read everything and anything. It’s the best way to learn, next to actually writing. You don’t need to break the bank purchasing books, the internet is a treasure trove of reading material, free of charge.

Write as much as you can, whenever you can. 15 minutes per day is enough to create muscle memory. As mentioned before, writing haikai can happen anywhere. You don’t need a fancy place to do it, just do it and keep working on your craft. 

Write and then put your work aside for awhile. Go back and look at it with fresh eyes. Don’t be in a rush to submit, let your work marinade for a time. 

Edit. Sometimes a poem may emerge fully formed, other times it may take a while to figure out. Don’t rush the process. 

Submit. Take the time to research the journals or contests where you are submitting. Make sure your work is a good fit for them and make sure they are a good fit for YOU. Be choosy and most of all, make sure your poem(s) is ready for an editors eyes.

Rejection. It happens to all of us. Rejection is feedback. Take it with a grain of salt. There are many reasons why an editor may not choose your poem and sometimes it just comes down to fit and isn’t a reflection of your writing ability. If nothing else, this gives you time to take another look at your poem and see if it might need tweaking. If you think it is perfect as-is, research another journal and try resubmitting it. Bottom line: try not to take it personally. 

As an editor, I look for tanka that moves me in some way, that are well-crafted, have some level of musicality and flow easily off the tongue when read aloud. I like work that doesn’t feel forced or contrived, that is authentic. In short, not trying too hard to be something it is not.

Last, but not least: have fun. Enjoy what you are doing. Try not to take yourself too seriously. The important thing is that you are writing. Be proud of yourself and celebrate your achievements…big and small. 

6.

TTH: Do you show your work in progress to anyone, or is it a solitary art that you keep close to your chest before letting it go for publishing? 

RH:

Typically I work on a poem until it feels fairly polished before showing it to anyone. My partner is usually my first reader. I also have a couple of close friends in the haikai world and we share our work, provide each other with honest, relevant feedback. To me, this is invaluable and these friends are dear to me. 

A writing life can be quite solitary, sometimes isolating, so having a safe space to share is vitally important (to me). I often find myself too close to a piece that I can’t see it objectively. It’s helpful to have another set of eyes and ears…to discuss blocks and parts that aren’t fitting quite right. It’s also a great way to learn about giving and receiving feedback. We can learn so much from one another and about different perspectives and ideas we may not have previously considered.

I hope this is what you were looking for. Please let me know if you need anything different. I will send you the tanka/TP in a bit.

XO

Reid

Now for Reid's tanka and tanka-prose for the final week:

each morning

the red fox slinks past

our cottage

I cling to the hope 

that she is a messenger

from loss is a river (2024)

the orca

carries her dead calf

through the strait 

for days I hold your hand

until you let go

from loss is a river (2024)

Social Graces

It’s almost midnight and I’m schlepping my way to work for my graveyard shift. A whoosh of cool air hits me as I make my descent into the underground station, a welcome reprieve from the unrelenting heat and humidity. It feels so good that I just stand there for a second, soaking it up. 

A guy in a security uniform brushes past me onto the platform. He jostles ahead as the train pulls in. As he steps inside his feet slip out from underneath him, arms windmilling dramatically before he crashes onto his back, brown paper bag falling out of his hand.

I go to help, but he is sliding all over the aisle in a massive pool of vomit. The stench is overwhelming. I quickly check my pockets for tissue, but come up short. By the time we reach the next station, the guy is sitting alone and everyone else is studiously avoiding eye contact.

a breach

in the fabric of

humanity

sometimes i wonder 

how we ever evolved 

Drifting Sands Haibun, Issue 26

Your Challenge this Week!

We'd love to know your thoughts on Reid's beautiful poems.

Write tanka and tanka-prose inspired by Reid's poems. Honest and simple.

Go for it.

I'm quoting Reid here: Last, but not least: have fun. Enjoy what you are doing. Try not to take yourself too seriously. The important thing is that you are writing. Be proud of yourself and celebrate your achievements…big and small. 

And remember – tanka, because of those two extra lines, lends itself most beautifully when revealing a story. And tanka prose is storytelling.

Give these ideas some thought and share your tanka and tanka-prose with us here. Keep your senses open, observe things that happen around you and write. You can post tanka and tanka-prose outside of these themes as well.

PLEASE NOTE

1. Post only one poem at a time, only one per day.

2. Only 2 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 250 words) to be considered for inclusion in the haikuKATHA monthly magazine.