Welcome Message

[Jenny Angyal]

Welcome to Inkstone Poetry Forum

Inkstone Poetry was created in honor of Jane Reichhold (1937-2016), writer, poet, translator, publisher, teacher, mentor, and friend. Our primary purpose is to continue Jane’s legacy by fostering the writing of Japanese short-form poetry in English. To this end, we have created the Inkstone Poetry Forum, an international community that welcomes anyone with a sincere interest in writing haiku, tanka, or their related forms.

For an excellent discussion of the value of peer feedback in developing your skills as a writer, click here.

We hope our guidelines (below) will help you decide if this forum is what you're looking for in a workshop experience. Please take a moment to read a selection of poems by some of our Inkstone members, then continue to the bottom of the page for instructions on how to become a member. We look forward to meeting you!

Posting Your Work

Inkstone is primarily a workshopping forum, so the posting of poems and constructive critiques are an essential part of membership. It might be helpful to think of this site as a potluck dinner. Please attend with your generous contributions, read and comment in the spirit of reciprocity, and interact considerately with other members. If you’d prefer to simply drop in, grab a bite, leave your calling card and move on, then Inkstone probably isn’t your best bet. However, if your application is accepted, you’re welcome to join us and see if this forum fits your needs.

This is a definitely a place for poets to share their haiku, tanka, senryu, kyoka, sequences, and poetry + prose works. While all these forms are welcome, we ask that you refrain from using labels (particularly 'senryu' and 'kyoka') in a disparaging way when commenting on other members' poems.

Please restrict your own poems for workshopping to no more than one in any 24-hour period in any one forum, up to a maximum of three per week per forum. This insures that every poem gets the time and attention it deserves.

We encourage new members to jump right in and post comments and poems. Inkstone is primarily a workshopping forum, so the posting of poems and constructive critiques is an essential part of membership.

For all members: your active participation is essential to Inkstone. Members are strongly encouraged to post at least a few of their own poems in addition to substantive comments. If you don't participate in at least one workshopping forum for a period of six months, your Inkstone account will be deactivated.

Unfortunately, the Inkstone Moderators do not have the resources to send reminders. If you find your account has been closed and you wish to return, just email us as soon as you feel able to participate consistently, and your account will be reactivated.

Please note that frequently logging on without posting anything is regarded as 'lurking' and may result in deactivation.

Responding to Others

Comments are the lifeblood of the forum, so we ask that for every piece you post, you write substantive, informative comments on the work of at least two other poets in the same forum. A thread established by another poet is not the place to post your own work even if citing it as an example.

Please keep your comments focused on the poem or topic under discussion, without expressing your opinion about the poet. Constructive criticism is welcome, but remember to acknowledge the strengths of the piece under discussion, and keep all comments courteous, respectful, and kind.

One successful way of critiquing involves sandwiching your suggestions, criticisms, and questions in between opening and closing comments that are positive and encouraging. Some people respond well to praise, others to minor suggestions, and some to a healthy dose of constructive criticism.

You will find the forum a friendly place where members enjoy getting to know each other; however, we discourage long private conversations not directly relevant to the poem under discussion. If you wish to chat about non-poetry matters, please use the Private Message system, maintaining the same standard of courtesy expected in the forums. Each forum has one or more moderators who are dedicated to fostering poetry in a safe and educational atmosphere. If you have problems or suggestions regarding Inkstone, please contact one of the Forum Moderators or the Global Moderators, whose names appears at the bottom of this page.

The above guidelines Posting Your Work and Responding to Others are requests and, as a courtesy to others, members are expected to follow them. If a member repeatedly and / or flagrantly disregards these guidelines a moderator will send a PM asking the poet to abide by them in future. Moderators may also post reminders about the guidelines in a particular forum.

Code of Conduct

Poems or discussion threads that treat controversial topics are acceptable, but condoning violence, racism, homophobia, sexism, or hatred against any group or individual will not be tolerated. Comments must focus on the merits of the poem as a work of literature—or on the topic under discussion—without diverging into irrelevant political opinion or other potentially divisive commentary. Inkstone will not tolerate sexual harassment, flaming, or displays of ego or anger.

We expect members to be aware that poems and ideas are intellectual property protected by copyright law. To ‘borrow’ phrases, images, or ideas from poems posted on this forum without giving proper credit fits the definition of plagiarism. We rely on the goodwill and courtesy of all members to respect the ownership of the poems submitted for workshopping and to not share them with anyone else without the poet’s permission.


Haiku and Tanka by Inkstone Poets

Thanks to Haiku & Tanka Forum Moderator Elliott Simons
for selecting the poems for this Poetry Feature.

May 2024

a string of prayer flags
holding the night breeze
… letting it go

~Chen-ou Liu, Second Place, Maya Lyubenova International Haiku Contest, 2024


clearing skies
wind ruffles the water
in a little red wagon

~Frank Hooven, British Haiku Society Awards, 2023


end of the season
eyes closed I see my late wife
among rose blossoms

~Chen-ou Liu, Winning Haiku, 5th Haiku Hike Literary Competition


echoes of laughter . . .
the empty teapot
still warm

~Nicholas Rossler, Presence #78, April 2024


.......mirror, mirror
a blue wren beak to beak
......with his reflection

vanishing forests –
on a high-rise balcony
the currawong’s nest

~Lorin Ford, Presence #78, April 2024


cautious steps
avoiding the squeaky board
and discussion

~David Josephsohn, Failed Haiku 99, April 2024


smudged glass—
the gorilla and I
lock eyes


family reunion . . .
weeds fill the path
to the sandbox

~Theresa A. Cancro, Presence # 78, March 2024


Undefeated

summer heat
my parents worry
about polio

One of Daddy’s legs was shorter than the other, but I never imagined how this affected him growing up. I was a teenager when he revealed his hardships: “The other boys bullied me because they knew I couldn’t catch them, but I hid in the bushes or around a corner, caught them by surprise, then beat’ em up. During the Depression, I searched for a job. The bosses would look me up and down, and say, ’No, we can’t use you,’ even though I could outwork most men. The government saved me with a scholarship to barber school.”

Daddy cut hair, banked his money, and bought land on the Texas Coast. During my early childhood, I barely knew him as he left at sunrise and came home after dark.

handmade boots
he orders ostrich skin
in two different sizes

~Lynn Edge, MacQueen’s Quinterly 23, April 2024


rain beats
against my windows—
remembering
the sound
of your rage

autumn unfolds
in a towering stand
of sunlit aspens—
copper, auburn, russet,
the many shades of me

~stacey dye, red lights 20:1, January 2024


Inklings

on my path
a hawk’s feather
damp
and tattered
pointing the way

witches’ butter
in a winter wood—
its magic spell
transmogrifying twigs
from lifelessness to life

I listen
to a sparrow scratching
leaf-deep
in streak and speckle
nameless as I

thorns
of barbed wire
jutting through bark . . .
patiently the sweetgum
swallows them all

be still and know
the golden-crowned kinglet
that I am . . .
chickadee, titmouse
and gilt-edged leaf

~Jenny Ward Angyal, Ribbons 20:1, spring/summer 2024



Ready to Join?

We welcome new members with a serious interest in writing haiku or tanka. If you would like to join the Inkstone Poetry Forum, please send an email to inkstonepoetryforum@gmail.com and tell us a little bit about yourself and how you heard about Inkstone. If possible, provide a reference. After reviewing your information, we will send you an email with instructions for activating your account. If you don’t hear from us within 48 hours, please check your junk mail or spam folder before reporting a problem.




Global Moderators: Leanne Mumford and Jenny Angyal
Revised 9/18/23