Special Feature: Selected Tanka for National Domestic Violence Awareness Month

My Dear Readers:

The month of October has been recognized internationally as National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, also known as Intimate Partner Violence Awareness Month. 

And

Survivors sat in shame, and society often looked away from what people too often dismissed as a “family affair.” 

--- President Joe Biden, "A Proclamation on National Domestic Violence Awareness and Prevention Month, 2023"

Here are the tanka selected for your reflection on this important yet difficult issue:

a winter fog

smothers the winding road

to her mother's house

the bruises on her face

say everything & nothing

Bulgarian and English Tanka Handbook, 2022

Chen-ou Liu

my neighbor 

rubbing the thickened skin

of her scar ...

her husband cuts off my question

and she replies, I just fell

Chen-ou Liu

you ask 

about this bruise 

the color of a crow 

I wave my hand 

like a wing, wounded

Take Five: Best Contemporary Tanka, III, 2010

Angie LaPaglia 

listening

as her memory

slips

the family ghosts

out of the closet

Honorable Mention, 2014 TSA International Tanka Contest                

Celia Stuart-Powles

                

the scar

of an open-cut mine

the wounds

that remind me

I am still alive                                                                        

Eucalypt, 22, 2017

Carole Harrison 

To conclude today's post, I would like to share with you the following two Inspirational Domestic Violence Quotes:

You are not the darkness you endured. You are the light that refused to surrender.

-- John Mark Green

You can recognize survivors of abuse by their courage. When silence is so very inviting, they step forward and share their truth so others know they aren’t alone. 

-- Jeanne McElvaney

Chen-ou