Dragonflies - Jim Burns

Dragonflies hover 

kissing the lips of the pond

but it saddens me

that before their kiss is felt 

they are gone to another.

Written by Jim Burns

Indiana born and bred

lives in Florida

will write poetry or prose 

however the mood might strike.

Upreach - Louis Faber

The reeds reach upward

dreaming they are green rice shoots

slowly turning gold

in the sight of the sun lit smile

cast by old Fujiyama.

Louis Faber is a widely published poet living in Florida with his wife and his cat (his editor, she claims).

Blythe II - D. P. Gooding

All roads are awash;

think of Bill Clinton’s father,

who drowned in a ditch 

for another man to point

his son towards history.

D. P. Gooding: shortlisted for the Alpine Fellowship Poetry Prize 2022; published in Drabblez and Dog-Ear.

Moonsting - Kenneth Pobo

This kick-the-can moon

lands on our lawn, lighting up

a shy dandelion

and a small patch of clover

where a bee stung my right foot.

Kenneth Pobo has a new book forthcoming from Wolfson Press called Raylene and Skip.  He has worked for North Dakota Quarterly.

key to blue skies - Gerard Sarnat

 i’ma little guy

—chooses big fat long ‘shroom—flies

higher’n a kite:

Ben Franklin invented/was

one helluva lightning rod.

Gerard Sarnat MD’s won prizes/authored four collections; Gargoyle, Brown, Stanford, Harvard, Main Street Rag, New Delta Rev published.

GerardSarnat.com

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Tanka!

Since first launching this online journal it has come to our attention that the form of verse we are publishing is not generally considered to be tanka in the true sense of the word. Although in Japanese tanka consist of 31 Japanese sounds ("on"), this does not translate directly into 31 syllables in English; as Founder and President of the Tanka Society of America Michael Dylan Welch points out, English syllables and Japanese "on" are not the same thing, and most writers of tanka in the English language usually aim for closer to 21 syllables or fewer.* Bearing this in mind, as well as the fact that even the five-line structure is not authentic to the form (Japanese tanka consisting of one or two lines written vertically), it would seem that what we publish here are not tanka at all, but a bastardized Western version of the genre.

Having adhered to the 5-7-5-7-7 structure for so many years, we were a tad dismayed to be informed of this - the more so for having cleverly incorporated (or so we thought) the number 31 into the name of our journal. However, although we intend to find out more and try and learn the genuine method for writing English language tanka, we still enjoy this erroneous format that we have practiced for so long (both the writing and the reading of it), as we're sure many of you still do who are reading this. This is why we have decided to continue to accept them in this journal, only henceforth we shall refer to the poems we publish as "tankers", in order to differentiate them from genuine tanka.

If the bona fide English language tanka journal can be likened to a real Italian margherita pizza, then 31 Gorutenda will be the deep dish ham and pineapple version - not as authentic, but still enjoyable.** And still poetry.

* If, like us, you are interested in finding out more about writing proper English language tanka and haiku etc. then there are plenty of links to resources and reading matter on the subject at Michael Dylan Welch's website:

https://www.graceguts.com/further-reading

**Before you start writing in to say that pineapple on pizza is an abomination, I don't have another post I can direct you to, so I'm afraid you're just going to have to live with it.

Submit to 31 Gōrutendā

At 31 Gōrutendā we are all about ‘tankers’: five-line poems with a 5-7-5-7-7 syllable structure - and before you write in to say that tanka is spelt wrong and does not actually follow these rules at all, please first go and read our post about it entitled ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Tanka!’ We know it’s not authentic, that’s why we’ve spelt it differently - but in any case, if it’s got 5 lines and 31 syllables that’s good enough for us.

Send up to three of your individual tankers, or longer poems with tanker-style verses to gorutenda31@gmail.com along with a short author bio (this should also ideally be no longer than 31 syllables give or take) and a link to your website if you have one - if you also want to submit a picture of some sort to accompany your work then feel free, although we may not necessarily use it.

We will be reading submissions all year round and will aim to publish one new poem every week.