birds drift
over the meadow
summer-deep
the distant pulse
of a tambourine
Author: Jenny Ward Angyal
Jenny Ward Angyal lives on a small organic farm in Gibsonville, NC, USA, with her husband and one Abyssinian cat. Her tanka have appeared in various online and print journals and may also be found at www.grassminstrel.blogspot.com
filaments of snow
drifting sideways
on the wind--
old pines
shed their ghosts daffodils
running wild
among the stones
of an old homestead
voices echo
discarding
thirty-year-old letters . . .
the fresh scent
of pine seedlings
springing up in the clear cut
news
of a distant suicide —
one leaf
spirals downward
toward glittering frost
passing strangers
on a rain-drenched road
we turn back
to ask their stories
. . . finding only mist
a raven
tumbling
across the sky
my wild mind
in his beak
gathering
dark-red roses
I trim the thorns
cutting off regrets
before a petal falls