Issue 4 - March 2026 - Tanka prose 5

The Stone

 

A hybrid responsive tanka/collaborative tanka prose by:

Jim Chessing, USA 

Joy McCall, UK

January 2026

 

 be at peace

imagine that you are a flower

a stone, the wind,

or a running stream

where pain has no purchase

 

I sleep inside a stone

on the river bed

and the wind blows

and the ripples stir

and still ... I sleep

 

my stone used to be

a boulder on the side

of a mountain

and like a child

I never wanted to sleep

 

keep very still

and silent then

lest Sisyphus come

and play his evil games

with your soul

 

it was neither wind

nor earthquake nor avalanche

I just got tired

of holding myself up

so one day I let go

 

Where did you land when you 'let go’?

 

I broke into a thousand pieces and a million grains of sand. I covered trees and shrubs with dust. Bigger pieces found new ground to stand on. Other parts made piles like monarch butterflies huddling to keep warm. I stopped holes where badgers and ground squirrels have their homes, and they had to make new entrances. I regret that. And yet other parts made it all the way down the ravine and splashed into the river and settled on the bottom for an indeterminate length of time until a young girl came to sleep inside. She sleeps there still. Careful, lest she be disturbed.

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