Thirty-One
Thirty-one syllables, in a five, seven, five, seven, seven arrangement.
Tanka can be mini-micro stories
or short meditations on situations observed.
Sometimes with a twist at the end.
Slender and awkward
Serial monogamists
They don’t mate for life
Just fall in love for a year
Ungainly but elegant
A tarmac ribbon
Unravelling between fields
Of fat-eared sweetcorn
We follow as it unfurls
Drive wherever it takes us
Dogs on verandahs
Sleep like the dead; let them lie
The air, paper-thin
Cuts round mountain silhouettes
Unwraps city from jungle
Scattering footfalls
Slap and clap the alleyway
Pursuing or chased?
The streets narrow behind them
The day closes like a door
There is no farmhouse
No sign of an olive grove
There is no forest
There are no streetlights, no roads,
No telegraph poles - just grey
Spearfishing, early
Windswept and interesting
Prowling for precious
With belly-filling purpose
As fins flash away downstream
In the hinterland
Somewhere between sleep and wake
A whiff of perfume
Dances in the bedroom air
And it’s gone as his eyes close