Tag Archives: poetry

How to Write a Tanka Prose

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Buzzard pursued by crow

This an answer to a query raised in the comments, but it’s something for everyone to read. Have a go, you might like it.

First, read this. Then abandon thoughts of haiku and haibun for a moment.

If I were starting again I would start with tanka prose. These are like haibun in that they contain prose and a poem, but they are more relaxed.

The trouble lies with the poem. A tanka is a small poem (5-7-5-7-7) according to general wisdom. This isn’t true. That syllable count should be the maximum. You can write fewer syllables.

Some editors like to preserve the short-long-short-long-long layout, others don’t mind as long as it has five lines. It’s just a poem and can include poetic effects, though probably not rhyme. As such, it is free from all the baggage that comes with haiku, and all the conflicting views of editors.

Little Egret at Aldeburgh

You can find tanka and tanka prose in Contemporary Haibun Online, Quail Eggs and Cattails. These are all available online. They are also easy to submit to if you want to have a go at being published.

Rather than listen to me, just read tanka and then practice. If I write ten tanka (which can take between twenty minutes and a week) you can be sure that at least one will tail off without being finished, and a couple will clearly be rubbish that can’t be helped by editing. Even after editing it’s likely that only two or three will be good enough to retain. That’s normal. Just keep writing and eventually you will get there. Don’t take notice of your internal editor until you have written a batch, or you will never actually finish a poem.

Eventually you will have enough to send off. Do it. You won’t be published unless you make submissions.

I send out a batch, one is probably accepted, the rest come back. I add another and send them out again. Usually one of the rejects will be picked at this point. I sometimes send things out three four times before I get fed up with them. By that time I usually have replacements written.

Little Egret – Blacktoft Sands

Next – tanka prose. They are like a haibun but with a tanka rather than a haiku. There is some discussion whether a haibun should be in haiku-like language (ie terse and often slightly stilted). You don’t have that with tanka prose, just write what you like. If you can write a blog post you can write a prose section for a tanka prose.

Then write the tanka to go with it. Some people claim to write the haiku/tanka first then write the prose section. I can’t do that. I write the prose and then write a suitable tanka.

Here are some comments I had recently.

“I think the haiku are not nearly as successful as the prose in your haibun.”

“After a careful review of your poem, I regret that I have had to pass it on.”

“Unfortunately, your work did not quite fit the shape that the issue ended up taking.”

“I’m afraid I don’t get this piece. Is it me or is its meaning or intention too obscure?”

The lesson from those comments is that not every submission ends in success and it’s all par of the process.

Heron

So, to summarise – read, write, submit, expect rejection, read, write, submit . . .

Eventually it will work out, but expect some rejections to begin with. At the start the rejections can seem depressing, overpowering and inevitable. Eventually you will get an acceptance, then another, and it will gradually build up . . .

There’s a lot of other stuff tha goes into writing a good tanka prose, and eventually I might learn some of it, but for the moment I find that the best way to work is to write plenty, submit a lot, shrug off rejection and recycle the rejects.

The recycling is key to my writing – it saves effort, and when a reject is accepted it proves that editing is a matter of opinions and rejected work is not always bad work. And above all, it’s about hard work and  persistence rather than that ephemeral thing we call talent

Good luck.

Cormorant, Lowestoft, Suffolk

I Dream of Writing Thunderbolts

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I had an answer to the last of February’s submissions yesterday – two poems accepted.  Today, I had the first reply for my March submissions – two poems accepted. That makes 15 so far this year. As a percentage my acceptances are about 50%, but I’m submitting to magazines that have resisted me for years in some cases, so I expect it. It’s all part of the hardening process.

Even the presence of growing queues at filling stations couldn’t bring me down, though it did stop me becoming 100% happy. The world appears to be at war and I can’t do a thing to stop it. I could write a poem, but that probably wouldn’t make the lunatic warlords stop the war, even if I could write a veritable thunderbolt of a poem.

My Orange Parker Pen

And that’s it. I sat up late two nights ago, grappling with last minute submissions. I then got up early to drop Julia at wood turning. Last night I also sat up writing. Then  I got up early(ish) this morning to take Julia to the railway station. I gazed at my screen for a few hours and did some basic tasks, went to the doctor, came back and more or less closed down. Couldn’t concentrate and eventually fell asleep a couple of times. It’s not been one of my finest days.

I have to be off early tomorrow morning too, as I have an appointment with rheumatology a 9.30. OK, not terribly early, but early enough. One of the qualities I had in youth was the ability to bounce back after limited sleep. I seem to have lost that.

The good news is that I only have one submission planned for April. Sometimes it falls like that. I can polish something that has been returned this month and try it again. I already have a piece in mind from the batch that was returned this morning.

In that quiet month I can catch up, regroup and, I hope, write some quality stuff. Maybe that veritable thunderbolt of a poem is waiting to be written next month . . .

Deep down, I want to be Dylan Thomas and write this poem.

 

 

 

 

More Poetry

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My Orange Parker Pen

This is a tanka prose that was first published in Blithe Spirit 36.1, the journal of the British Haiku Society, in February this year. It is different from the original version, which was about eggs and lockdown and parents. This is about writing a poem and cooking eggs. It deviates slightly from reality as I mention coffee, where we always have tea for breakfast. Tea doesn’t really smell so I took the lazy way out and said we had coffee so I could add an extra sense to the poem.

But first, a tanka, from the same issue. It is based on the annual culling of the Christmas card list as my circle of cousins decreases.

old Christmas card
displayed again
fading slightly
sent by a man
who will not send another

I thought that’s what it was about, anyway. Julia reads it as a story about the Christmas card I have been sending her since 1988. It’s a good one and the message is still relevant. Why waste money, I ask, on another?

 

Life, seen in a Frying Pan

In lockdown, I decided to make better scrambled eggs and wrote a poem in my head as I stirred and learned. It spilled onto paper, took shape and, like the eggs, looked good. On the first rejection I checked all the words and moved them into better order. On the second I added an anecdote, on the third an allegory. At the fourth attempt I slimmed it down.

After five attempts I wondered if it might be bad, or if editors might dislike poems about scrambled eggs. When you think about it, it isn’t a subject you ever see. Eventually it faded from my mind, as poems like it often do. Recently, stirring eggs and making breakfast for my wife, I breathed in the toast and coffee smells and remembered the first line.

five eggs
two broken yolks
a speck of shell
things which are not perfect
still turn out well

The pen that Julia made at the wood turning group

The Glittering Prize

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The world continues to offer glittering prizes to those who have stout hearts and sharp swords
F E Smith, Lord Birkenhead

I thought I’d quote Smith for the title, but make it plain I had done so. I didn’t want you to think I’d just nicked the title off the telly, though this is probably unlikely as I just looked it up and find it aired in 1976. hardly a current reference.

I needed a title with “prize” in it as I just won a poetry prize. It’s a poem of the issue award from Eucalypt, a tanka magazine. Every issue, they have two, chosen by the winners of the previous issue’s awards. I now have a commentary on my work and my subscription has been extended by an issue. More worryingly for a man with a very lacklustre education, I have select a winner from the next issue and supply a commentary for it. The one supplied for mine was insightful. The one supplied for the other winner was decidedly erudite. The one about mine used the word trochee. It’s something like 53 years since I last used the word trochee. I’m pretty sure I only used it once then.

As I grow in confidence as a poet I no longer worry about imposter syndrome and am sure I will mange to write an acceptable commentary. I can blog, I can write poetry and I can write about coins, how difficult can it be? I’ll need a few quotes to fill up the space but as long as I get down to it promptly I should be OK.

In the meantime, I should get on with my medallion presentation and making lunch ready for Julia’s return. The poem was a about the stripy shed on the MENCAP Gardens – that’s the pictures today.

I now, of course, regret not taking a photo of the whole shed instead of being arty.

24 Posts 26 Days

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I suppose the title gives things away. Despite all my good intentions this will be post 24, but it is 26th January. Two days have been swallowed up by that mad whirl of naps, TV and procrastination. I can pull two days back quite easily, so it isn’t a problem for now. Be prepared for two supplementary posts over the coming days.

I had an email from an editor yesterday, two more acceptances, bringing the total for 2025 to 55. I know numbers mean nothing, because it’s about quality. But at the same time it does mean I’ve been applying myself to writing and I carried the plan through.

It’s the same with a blog a day – it doesn’t mean I’m writing better blog posts but it does, I hope, mean that I will improve because of the constant practice.

The same goes for ideas. In the past I have hoarded ideas, ready for the day when I feel that stars have aligned and the day is propitious for one of my great ideas. However, theory, and reality, seem to indicate that the more ideas you use, the more you will generate. It does seem to work.

In other contexts, I don’t consider this a good thing. Every time I think about it I remember being in a meeting once where one aspiring volunteer (or aspiring chair, if the truth is told) said “My strength is having ideas. If anyone needs an idea, just ask.”

What still makes me grit my teeth at this, is that everyone can have ideas, but what you need on a committee is people who will work.

That’s the secret with most things. I can have all the ideas I like, but if I don’t work, nothing happens. That’s why quantity is important, it means you are doing the work which will lead to quality. And if you are doing the work and achieving the quality, you may, with luck, become good.

Sunset at Sherwood

 

A Nomination is Announced

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Leaves and frost – Wilford, Nottingham

I’ve just had a newsletter through from the Tanka Society of America, and in it they have a list of the people they have put through as nominees for the Pushcart Prize. Those of you who think I am called Quercus (which was a name I go by the accident of working for Quercus Community when I started the blog) will wonder why I’m bothering to tell you this. Those of you who know my real name will note that it appears on the list, and all will become clear.

Although I am quite pleased with it, it’s important to remember that it’s only a nomination. I have won nothing.  On the other hand, an editor (or in this case two editors) have picked me out as being the writer of one of the six best things they have published this year. Pleasing as that is, there’s a big difference between a nomination and winning a prize. However, like the Oscars, people do note in their biographical notes that they are nominees. This is handy, as I’ve never yet won anything for writing. In fact I’ve never been a runner-up either – just “highly commended”. Twice in twenty years. You will not find me mentioned anywhere as an overnight success.

Heron at Clumber Park

I did get into the Red Moon Anthology a couple of times, I also slipped out again, as you are only as good as your last poem.  The first year I was in, I worried about never making it again. The next time, I worried less, but it wasn’t a great year and I didn’t write anything good enough to be chosen. That was depressing, but also made me concentrate a bit more, so I have bounced back. Of course, the trick is making sure I keep the quality coming.

Pushcart Prize Nominations for 2025

November 25, 2025

The Tanka Society of America is pleased to announce the following nominations for The Pushcart Prize: Best of the Small Presses LI anthology, as selected by Ribbons editors Liz Lanigan and Susan Weaver.

For those of you who are interested, this poem was turned down three times before it was accepted and became my most “successful” poem to date.  I actually think I may have written better poems last year, but that is how it goes. I certainly wrote worse ones!

Robin at Clumber, Nottinghamshire

 

The Dog-Eared Page 

Stumbling, after treading on my trouser cuffs, I fall against the wall. I have grown portly, and my waist has dropped, making my trouser legs too long. It is a hazard of old age I had not anticipated and I, like Prufrock, must wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled. Balding, sniggered at, ignored by singing sirens, I stagger on a one-way trip through the strange country that is old age. I never thought, when I first read Eliot as a teen, that I was looking at a route map of my life.

the road ahead
is shorter than the one
behind
crowded with regrets
and tests I did not pass

 

A Plan is Born

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Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Plans for next year include writing more, writing better, managing my time and, most importantly, finding new markets. I’ve done over 80 articles on coins and related subjects but they have all been published in the lower levels of society journals.  I don’t want to be rude about them, but it’s not really a challenge getting into something where you are one of two regular contributors and they are read by about six people.

The situation with the articles is that I am either going to have to up my game or stop writing them and use the time for something else. In my first stint as a poet I wrote for new magazines and those known to be easier to get into. It produced results, but when I restarted a few years ago I aimed for the better quality magazines. It has gone quite well and I feel like I have produced something worth doing.

Next year, instead of producing 85+ articles for society Facebook pages and the like, I want to appear at least 12 times in magazines which pay and the journals of the more serious  kind. I think 12 is realistic, just as 50 (again) is realistic for poetry.  That’s why the target is now set at 60 and 15 – there’s no point in sitting back and feeling complacent. At the same time, I still want to support the societies I’m in but I’m going to reduce my output to around 50. I’ve asked other people to help but they haven’t responded, or have made excuses, and they can’t complain if I do other things.

Photo by Roman Koval on Pexels.com

That, of course, is the easy bit. I now have to work out how I’m going to manage my time and actually achieve the targets. That’s the trouble with planning to write more – the first day or two will be taken up with planning. And I just remembered that one of the regular magazines has pulled out.  That will be six fewer slots to aim for.

I will, to be honest, simply send more poetry out and develop a new range of work. I’ve never done a haiga, for instance, which is a photograph with a haiku. Nor have I ever tried any of the linked forms where you put haiku or tanka together to form longer poems. It also feels like time to get back into free verse. And there you go – a plan is born.

Orange Parker Pen

Using the pen pictures reminds me once again that my efforts at product placement have not met with much success. Either that or my complimentary Parker pen has been lost in the post.

Next year I may lower my sights a bit and use pictures of snack food.

 

The Worst Time Planner in the World

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Sunset over Sherwood

It’s the end of the month in just under ten hours and I have submissions to make. More accurately, I have submissions to write. This is not ideal as everyone knows it takes months to write a good poem and let it mature.

I’ve been doing more enjoyable things for the last month. And a lot of non-enjoyable things. It doesn’t really matter – I have frittered my time and now have very little left. I have decided with one of the two submissions, that I won’t bother this month. They have published me once in seven years so I’m not going to beat myself up about it. The other, I will try. It’s a new stsrt-up and deserves support. If someone is willing to start a magazine and put the hours in, I feel writers should give it some support. It doesn’t mean I expect to get in, but I do want the editor to know I support her efforts.

Green’s Windmill – Nottingham 

So am I writing? Yes. I’m writing a blog post. I don’t want to miss it, but I don’t want to do any real work either. It’s just the way I am and nothing seems to change me. It’s not laziness, as I’ve got through quite a lot of stuff this month, just not followed the Poetry Plan.

At one time I used to have so much material in hand that I actually used to wait for submission windows to open as I could send things out on day one. Now I end to be in right at the end. In mitigation I plead several illnesses and a much increased number of submissions. In truth, with no sense of urgency and a love of procrastination, it was always likely to end up this way despite my plans and good intentions.

However, look on this blog post as an example of my double edged sword of a predicament (or double-ended pencil, if you prefer a writing metaphor. I said I would get back to daily blogging so I need to write this to make sure that happens, and because the daily blogging will be good for my writing in other areas too.

So, I’d better get on with the poetry. I have just over nine hours left and I also have to bring the shopping in and cook a meal tonight. Julia is in the cafe this afternoon so it’s only fair that I cook.

Time, he’s waiting in the wings . . . as Bowie reminds us. Though he went on to say  He speaks of senseless things, which is bit close to the mark when you look at my subject matter.

A Creaking gate hangs the lonest . . .

 

Report of Two days – Good in Places

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Yesterday seems to have been a day of doing much, but finishing without a lot to show for it. I’ve edited a few pieces, written the start of two more and composed an article on a Coventry medallion. Then I cooked a couple of quiches and watched TV with Julia when she returned from her stint at the cafe.

She reset the TV yesterday morning. We’ve been having pixelation on some channels, which we originally put down to thunderstorms, then transmitter problems. Other things then started to malfunction and we eventually decided it needed resetting. This seems to have done the trick.

Two other good things happened too. One, I looked myself up on Google, trying to find the haibun that was used as an example in a writing prompt article. I found it, so that’s good. It’s the first time someone has asked me to let them use a poem for something like that. As I’m unlikely to win the King’s Gold Medal for poetry or be offered an honorary doctorate, this is as good as it gets for me.

I also noted that I am on the submissions page of another magazine, where they have links to a few poems as examples, a tanka this time. It’s nice to be selected, particularly when I’m having a difficult patch.

Today then proceeded much the same as yesterday – a lot of effort producing no real results – and nothing good happened today. I’m looking for a garage to see to the car warning light and the one I selected told me it couldn’t do anything for two weeks. They have taken some details and will give me a general opinion tomorrow, but I now need to think if i want to use a garage that can’t see me for two weeks. I’ve been spoiled over the years by having decent garages and this isn’t how I want to go on. I don’t mind booking two weeks in advance for routine work, but two weeks to check a minor fault isn’t good.

Julia took a picture of a wooden gorilla at the weekend. It amuses her to make comparisons. She also bought two leaping hares. I like hares. I wrote a poem about hares. It was rejected several times. I may write another now we have the sculpture. I assume from other pictures she sent me, that she is thinking of stones and Japanese maples for the garden.

A Day of Non-Achievement

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Another day and a rejection. It wasn’t unexpected, because I haven’t been struggling for the last few months. Normally I would not have sent much out this month, but having set myself targets for submissions, and needing to show some self-discipline, I wrote and submitted anyway. In some ways it was a bad idea, but based on past experience I can’t afford to let the momentum fade.

Believe it or not, there was a time when I used to have all my submissions ready for the beginning of the month. I seemed to have so much time in those days. The theory was that if I submitted first, all the subsequent submissions had to do two things – one is that they had to be good enough for publication, but the second was that they had to be good enough to replace the submissions I’d already submitted. This works if editors look at submissions as they come in, but it doesn’t if they wait until the end of the submission period before looking.

There used to be a lot of blogs and internet articles about the science of submissions at one time. I couldn’t find any tonight. There were a few about how to submit (spelling, manners, timeliness, stick to the submissions guidelines etc) but none of the sort I wanted – the ones that used to treat it as pseudo-science and work out ways of increasing your chances by trickery and mind control.

Pictures are from Julia and my sister – they went round the Shaun the Sheep exhibition in Peterborough yesterday. More about that tomorrow. I now have a home made quiche to eat and a wife to talk to. She hasn’t seen much of me today as I have been messing about on the keyboard and achieving very little.

Ah well, time to go. I will add a few photos and talk about them in the next post.