Staff Notes: Tanka

Form

• 5 lines: short line, long line, short, long, long
• strict form uses syllable count to determine line length: 5 syllables, 7, 5, 7, 7
• American form is less strict in syllable count (17-31) but tends shorter -- e.g., 3, 5, 3, 5, 5
• since English, unlike Japanese, is a stressed timed language, sometimes stressed syllable count is used -- e.g., 2 accents, 3 accents, 2, 3, 3

Features

• concision
• implicit reference
• pivot/turn
• pillow-word
• pivot-word
• zeugma
• dropped/implied words

Notes

1. lineation should indicate natural pauses, caesura
2. usually there is a pivot -- often between the 3rd and 4th lines -- syntactic or semantic -- often a turn where the second part enhances or illuminates the first part -- often two images or else same image but two perspectives.
3. "pillow-word" is a poetic 'formula' that stands in for something else -- can be conventional or novel -- can be allusive rosy-fingered - Homer's dawn big shoulders - Sandburg's Chicago or like a kenning heaven's candle - Beowulf's sun ankle biter - Australian toddler
4. "pivot-word" is a word within the tanka's context has a double meaning -- how the word relates to what comes before varies from how it relates to what comes after. can be through semantic or syntactic ambiguity -- the sisters pine incense fills the air - "pine" is the pivot melting snow puddles in the dim hallway glimmer - noun/verb ambiguity of "puddles", "glimmer" can be through punning the coming generation will write our wrongs the optimal use of the pivot-word is in the pivot between the upper and lower parts of the tanka -- in this case, not only does the pivot-word have two meanings, it marks the boundary between the two units -- in this use a pivot-word is often a pivot phrase e.g., hot august an open fire hydrant flushes out (the pivot-phrase) the whole under-ten neighborhood (Art Stein) there's always a monkey beating off at the zoo -- school boys laugh, (the pivot phrase, ambiguous object of laughter) the facts of life not fitting into the teacher's plan. (Bob Lucky)
5. zeugma are also common -- like pivot-words, one word/phrase plays two roles they covered themselves with dust and glory -- Tom Sawyer he firmly held his tongue, and her hand
6. dropped words can be subjects (especially), prepositions, conjunctions, and even implied verbs
7. implicit references are preferred when establishing context in a tanka -- if you mention tulips, you don't have say it is spring -- if you mention cheese curds, you don't have to say you are in Wisconsin -- indicate place, time, emotion, gender, age, class, etc. by their symptoms rather than making them explicit
8. tanka sequences usually (should?) consist of tanka that could stand on their own but are related through shared motifs -- in addition, they are ordered through some progression through time, space, emotions, perspectives, tone -- these are the same principles used to group and sequence tanka in the imperial anthologies -- in shorter collections, these principles can create a cohesive synthesis (not a mere sequence) of independent tanka