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Atlas Poetica 12 ATLAS POETICA A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka Number 12 Summer, 2012 ATLAS POETICA A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka Number 12 Summer, 2012 M. Kei, editor Alex von Vaupel, technical director Christina Nguyen, editorial assistant 2012 Keibooks, Perryville, Maryland, USA KEIBOOKS P O Box 516 Perryville, Maryland, USA 21903 AtlasPoetica.org [email protected] Atlas Poetica A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka Number 12 – Summer 2012 Copyright © 2012 by Keibooks All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by reviewers and scholars who may quote brief passages. See our EDUCATIONAL USE NOTICE. Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka, a triannual print and e-journal, is dedicated to publishing and promoting fine poetry of place in modern English tanka (including variant forms). Atlas Poetica is interested in both traditional and innovative verse of high quality and in all serious attempts to assimilate the best of the Japanese waka/tanka/kyoka/gogyoshi genres into a continuously developing English short verse tradition. In addition to verse, Atlas Poetica publishes articles, essays, reviews, interviews, letters to the editor, etc., related to tanka poetry of place. Tanka in translation from around the world are welcome in the journal. Published by Keibooks Printed in the United States of America, 2011 ATPO 12: ISBN: 978-0615661865 AtlasPoetica.org TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial Brittle Light, Rodney Williams & Educational Use Notice .......................6 Patricia Prime ...............................34 Urban Tanka, M. Kei ..............................7 Individual Tanka ......................................35 Tanka in Sets and Sequences Our Hometown : Fukushima : A Reviews Gogyoshibun, Taro Aizu ...................9 Food for Thought, Edited by Amelia Town Hall, Autumn Noelle Hall ..........12 Fielden, Reviewed by Patricia Prime ..35 Then and Now : Vietnam from 1975 to Reflections: response tanka, by Sonja Arntzen Today, Nu Quang ..........................14 & Naomi Beth Wakan, Reviewed by A Cross, Genie Nakano .......................15 Patricia Prime ......................................56 The Mob, Keitha Keyes .......................15 explorers, stanley pelter ......................16 Articles Snow, Mike Montreuil .........................17 Five Lines Down: Am Interesting Moment in Fuair Cnocs—The Cold Hills, Autumn the History of Tanka in English, Charles Noelle Hall & Claire Everett ........18 D. Tarlton ............................................59 Twenty-Five Years, Lee Evans ..............19 Tanka Poets on Site, by Kath Abela Wilson Marking My Place : Paired Tanka, Lynda and Yiwei Huang ................................71 Monahan & Joy McCall ................20 Hula in the Outback, Marilyn Announcements Humbert .......................................24 Ai Li Publishes Books ..............................58 Questions Asked in Ignorance, Charles Call for Submissions: Ekphrastic Tanka ..77 Tarlton ..........................................25 Error Correction ......................................78 Cathedral Doors, Aubrie Cox ...............29 Take Five, Volume 4, Published ................78 Falling, GerryJacobson .......................30 Farm Holiday, Guy Simser ..................30 Biographies ..............................................79 Monday in Kapulena Orchards, Mark Kaplon ..........................................31 Tattoo, Ignatius Fay .............................31 Guttering Flame, Ignatius Fay ..............32 Educational Use Notice Keibooks of Perryville, Maryland, USA, publisher of the journal, Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka, is dedicated to tanka education in schools and colleges, at every level. It is our intention and our policy to facilitate the use of Atlas Poetica and related materials to the maximum extent feasible by educators at every level of school and university studies. Educators, without individually seeking permission from the publisher, may use Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka’s online digital editions and print editions, as primary or ancillary teaching resources. Copyright law “Fair Use” guidelines and doctrine should be interpreted very liberally with respect to Atlas Poetica precisely on the basis of our explicitly stated intention herein. This statement may be cited as an effective permission to use Atlas Poetica as a text or resource for studies. Proper attribution of any excerpt to Atlas Poetica is required. This statement applies equally to digital resources and print copies of the journal. Individual copyrights of poets, authors, artists, etc., published in Atlas Poetica are their own property and are not meant to be compromised in any way by the journal’s liberal policy on “Fair Use.” Any educator seeking clarification of our policy for a particular use may email the Editor of Atlas Poetica, at [email protected]. We welcome innovative uses of our resources for tanka education. Atlas Poetica Keibooks P O Box 516 Perryville, MD 21903 <http://AtlasPoetica.org> Urban : Tanka Urban tanka—tanka set in the cities Also in this issue is a two part article and suburbs—is not nearly as well- by Kath Abela Wilson and Yiwei Huang. represented as is the tanka of the They discuss how Poets on the Site countryside, wilderness, small towns, and became a workshop and performance exotic locations. Yet all of these places venue for poetry, music, dance, painting, shape our human experience and may be and other arts. Huang, who lives in China, loved as much as any small town or farm. furthers the multi-disciplinary and multi- Case in point, Taro Aizu has penned a national project by discussing his gogyoshibun (gogyoshi diary) about his translations into Chinese of ekphrastic hometown: Fukushima, Japan. Mixing tanka poems written in English in poetry, prose, grief, hope, and uncertainty, response to the works of the Chinese he gives a poignant view of survival after artist, Tong Zhang. the triple disaster. Also in this issue, we have the second New in this issue, Nu Quang gives us installment in series of long responsive an account of Saigon before and after the tanka pieces written by Autumn Noelle fall. Blank walls convey the impact of the Hall and Claire Everett focussing on the Communist victory more eloquently than Neolithic heritage of Ireland. ATPO will florid details ever could. Aubrie Cox run additional sequences in future issues. depicts cathedral doors nailed shut and Two new contributors, Lynda Monahan graffiti confessions on the wall, while and Joy McCall, offer a responsive tanka Ignatius Fay invites us to understand the sequence in a slightly different format, relationship between a Medic Alert offering new possibilities for a form that is bracelet and a tattoo. In poems like these, enjoying increasing popularity in tanka. we see how tanka’s ability to choose the right detail suggests far more than is ~K~ printed on the page. Charles Tarlton delivers another M. Kei analytical essay, this time on Five Lines Editor, Atlas Poetica Down, the seminal tanka journal of the Namib-Naukluft National Park is an ecological 1990s. Diving deep into the poetry and preserve in Namibia’s vast Namib Desert. Coastal essays of the short-lived journal, he urges winds create the tallest sand dunes in the world us to give up the clichéd, sentimental, and here, with some dunes reaching 980 feet (300 meters) in height. obvious in favor of deeper truths, originality, and the unique assets of the Cover Image courtesy of Our Earth As Art by English language. NASA <http://eros.usgs.gov/imagegallery/>. Atlas Poetica • Issue 12 • Page 7 Atlas Poetica • Issue 1 • Page 8 Our Hometown : Fukushima A Gogyoshibun （五行詩文) Taro Aizu 1 2 Most Japanese people return to their I stayed at my brother’s house and took hometowns and pray for their ancestors a walk with my nephews the next day. One before their tombs every summer. This of them said, “Oh, I’ve forgotten to take a Buddhist tradition is called “Obon” (お盆) dosimeter with me. “ He immediately went back home and brought it back with him. in Japanese. Following the tradition, I went Children in Fukushima always hang back to my hometown, Fukushima, to pray dosimeters around their necks whenever for my late parents last summer. But this they go out so that their teachers can time in 2011, I hesitated to return due to check their radiation levels later. We the contamination caused by the nuclear walked to a park by a river. leak at Fukushima Atomic Power Plant on March 11, 2011. The wind has spread Dosimeters cesium from the plant all across the hanging from their necks prefecture. It is said to be a cause of cancer even when the children for children and babies in the future. After play tag with me hesitating for a few days, I decided to go in the green park. back there in spite of this, for I believed I was too old to contract cancer from the But there were no children playing in fall-out. I went there by express bus in the park except my nephews. Maybe the August. When I got off, the fields spread others were home playing computer games out before me as far as the eye could see. or watching TV to avoid the cesium wind, for teachers at schools advised them to stay I can’t believe at home and play indoors as much as they have been contaminated
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