Monday, October 19, 2015

One Man's Maple Moon: Hurly-Burly Life Tanka by Marilyn Humbert

English Original

autumn deepens
leaves swirl and collide
in the chill wind
my hurly-burly life
churns with doubt

A Hundred Gourds, 3:1, December 2013

Marilyn Humbert


Chinese Translation (Traditional)


秋天加深
在寒風中樹葉
回旋和碰撞在一起
我的喧囂生活
帶著疑問地擾動不安

Chinese Translation (Simplified)


秋天加深
在寒风中树叶
回旋和碰撞在一起
我的喧嚣生活
带著疑问地扰动不安


Bio Sketch

Marilyn Humbert lives in the Northern Suburbs of Sydney NSW surrounded by bush. Her pastimes include writing free verse poetry, tanka, tanka prose and related genre. She is the leader of Bottlebrush Tanka Group and member of the Huddle and Bowerbird Tanka Groups. Her tanka appears in Australian and international journals.

1 comment:

  1. Modeled on traditional Japanese tanka, this visually riveting and thematically resonant poem is made up of five poetic phrases (equivalent to five ku of 5-7-5-7-7) and structured into two parts (“jo,” the preface, and the main statement) with a pivot (L3). And the prefatory image is “logically metaphoric or at least resonates closely with the emotional point of the poem” (ibid., xxiii-xxiv).

    Reference:

    Edwin Cranston, A Waka Anthology: Volume One: The Gem-Glistening Cup, Stanford University Press, 1998

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