TANKA TAKE HOME: 7th August 2024 - Claire Rosilda Norman- poet of the month

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

Introducing a new perspective to our Wednesday Feature!

August 7, 2024

poet of the month: Claire Rosilda Norman

The Corridors of Night

Before I cross the threshold, I remember everything. In that other place I have many faces. I speak with animals. I question angels.

that tiny sparrow

high in the sycamore tree

safe from claws and teeth

in her dreams

is she always a cat?

We had the pleasure of asking Claire a few questions, and she graciously took the time to answer them. Here is the first:

TTH: How did you get started as a poet? What was it about tanka that inspired you to embrace this ancient form of poetry? In short, why do you keep writing tanka?

Claire: How did I get started as a poet? Well, that goes right back into my deep history. My earliest memory is reciting a poem to my mother who wrote it down for me (I hadn't learned to write then). It involved a dog, a frog and a log, and I was very proud of myself at the time.

Fast forward to teenage angst and unrequited love. Less said the better...

2013 I joined All Poetry on a whim, just to see if I liked it. I did. This is where I discovered tanka and other Japanese poetry, and something just clicked in me. I knew nothing about it, perhaps because they were not so well known in the UK. This meant I had no bad habits to unlearn, which I see now as a blessing. I learned how to write tanka from one of the courses available there, and when I finished it I became the teacher, which accelerated my learning a great deal.

Some of the traditional themes of tanka are love, loss and longing; all deep emotions which we've all experienced at some time, and they can feel overwhelming. How do we cope? I cope through writing, taming those emotions with words and phrases, finding the path through when life is difficult, celebrating successes, counting blessings. Tanka just ticks the box for me, and more than ten years on I still write them regularly.

We asked Claire for her bio (she eventually admitted to...):

Claire: Hmm... what do I want to admit to?

I am a sixty something woman. My maths is not good, so whenever someone asks my age I have to do a quick calculation, hoping I have got the year right and it is past February. So mostly I just say sixty something.

I am English, I live within walking distance of the North Sea (about two hours walk). I love water in all its forms. I have a fascination for caves as well, though there are not many in this part of the world.

I have been married for a long time, with two children. Also two cats. They have all been a source of joy and inspiration.

Prompt for this week:

Claire was my teacher on All Poetry for two courses. Even though my assignments were often delayed, she graciously provided encouraging feedback. I am grateful for that. She introduced me to the world of tanka, haibun, and tanka-prose. I enjoy Claire's sense of humour, though most of her tanka, at least the ones I've read, are serious-ish. This short tanka-prose of hers made me smile, transporting me to the dream of a little bird and what lies beyond this earthly life. I love the prose; it holds so many possibilities, and the tanka, while shifting away, stays on theme. So, here's your prompt for the week: THE OTHER SIDE. Interpret it however you want; it can be anything. Think outside the box—or not. Mostly, have fun!

Important: Since we're swamped with submissions, and our editors are only human, mistakes can happen. Please, please, remember to put your name, followed by your country, below each poem, even after revisions. It really helps our editors; they won't have to type it in, saving them from potential typos. Thanks a ton!

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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 these themes too.

An essay on how to write tanka: Tanka Flights here

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.

Please check out the LEARNING Archives.

New essays are up! https://www.trivenihaikai.in/post/learning-archive

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