More Tanka

I got some pretty interesting responses from the last poem, so I wanted to share more - see if I can spark any more flames of interest.

A tanka, which is about 1300 years old, is structured by syllables of 5 - 7 - 5 - 7 - 7. But of course those are lost in translation. The meanings still get to me, though.

The following are my favorites, because reading them is like looking at my own brain. I know exactly what these young authors are talking about.

When I turned
the page of my calendar
at the end of the month,
the scene in my room
changed a bit.
-- H. I.

Mt. Fuji,
which I see
on my way to school
in the morning,
always makes me stop.
-- A. F.

The longest telephone call I've ever made
was to my mother.
Talking with her
somehow
calms me down.
-- M. M.

If it were Manga,
I could skip unpleasant days,
even test days,
by just writing
"A few days later..."
--Y. K.

From the time I began
to search for "What I could be,"
"What I want to be"
faded
further and further away.
-- M. T.

When I take up my pen
in the soft afternoon sunlight,
prisms of light
play in the margin
of my notebook.
-- S. S

Resting my pen,
I look through the window's glass
at the western sky,
and my heart is moved
by the evening glow.
-- A. O


Hope you enjoy. Maybe I'll write some of my own. Then you really could look at my brain.