English Original
watercolor poppies
blowing across the field ...
why
is it so hard
to learn from history
Honorable Mention, 2020 Tanka Society of America Tanka Contest
Rebecca Drouilhet
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
水彩描繪的罌粟花
被微風吹拂過整片田野
為什麼
從歷史中吸取教訓
有這麼困難嗎
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
水彩描绘的罂粟花
被微风吹拂过整片田野
为什么
从历史中吸取教训
有这么困难吗
Bio Sketch
Rebecca Drouilhet is a retired registered nurse who works as a poetry moderator. Her work has won awards, including a Sakura award in the 2012 Vancouver Cherry Blossom Contest and an Honorable mention in the same contest for 2017 as well as Editor's Choice awards and others. She enjoys reading, word games and spending time with her large family.
Like the first-place tanka, this poem compares this pandemic time to another historical reference point. In this case the image of windblown poppies conjures a symbol widely associated not with a victory garden but with World War I’s Flanders fields. The reference also emphasizes the current pandemic’s comparison to an unseen enemy and the previous war’s coincidental role in spreading the devastating 1918 flu. Just as Covid-19 has escalated into a worldwide health crisis, the previous pandemic resulted in widespread suffering and loss of life. The poet might have been speaking of humankind’s failure to learn from war, but there is also an inherent allusion to the post-war pandemic lesson: a cautionary tale that speaks to the impact of hastily abandoning quarantines that might have averted unnecessary casualties. It’s no wonder that the poem, like one of the other tanka recognized here, ends not with a statement but with a question as the poet skillfully shifts from a personal to a wide-angle and thought-provoking viewpoint.
ReplyDelete-- excerpted from the judge's commentary, accessed at https://www.tankasocietyofamerica.org/tsa-contest/past-winners-and-judges-comments/2020-winners