A New Bad Habit: Twitter

I didn't think I'd like Twitter, but I stumbled over its web interface and gave it a try. I've been pleasantly surprised. It's simple, easy to use, and lacking all the bells and whistles that make other social sites annoying, difficult, and prone to bugs. Twitter does what it does well. It doesn't do much, but that's okay; the emphasis is on the interaction between people. The shortness means you have to work hard to bore people to death, but at the same time allows you to have conversations. The 140 character limit for tweets (messages) is the perfect length for a haiku or tanka poet, and not surprisingly, there are tanka poets on Twitter.

They use hashtags (keywords) to make tweets searchable, and there are hashtags for #tanka and #tankagame and #twitpoems and various other forms of literature. So far folks have been nice and friendly. Of course you can search for whatever you like, and you can add whatever hashtags you want to your own posts to make them findable by others.

Another nice feature is that your Twitter home preserves the tweets, so even if you're not online, you can still get them. Likewise you can also receive direct messages (private messages). Unlike chat programs that require you to be online at the same time as the other person, you can read and reply to your tweets whenever you like. It's like email that way, except shorter, with simpler addresses.

And thank God, it does not have smiley faces or animated icons! The interface is clean and neat without a bunch of clutter and a million ways to annoy other people with cutesy things that aren't cute at all to the average adult human being.

If you're on Twitter, say hi @kujakupoet. If you're not on Twitter, give it a try.

Three Questions (Tanka)

Curtis Dunlap has been running a series on his Blogging Along Tobacco Road blog in which poets answers three questions about writing haiku. I wrote and asked him if I could mention tanka instead, and he said yes. My answers and three poems are now posted, and some folks have been kind enough to write comments. You can read it for yourself at: http://tobaccoroadpoet.blogspot.com/2009/04/m-kei-three-questions-tanka.html

Thanks for being open to tanka, Curtis.

~K~

Take Five : Best Contemporary Tanka blurbs

The following blurbs have been provided for Take Five : Best Contemporary Tanka. Step by step, the project comes to fruition.


"Powerful short stories written in five lines — that's what Take Five is all about.  This anthology is not just your tanka wallpaper variety; nearly every piece is a jumpstart for the heart that tells the truth about that four-letter word called "Life."  M.Kei and his team of editors are to be commended — when I was done reading Take Five, for a moment, I didn't know if I was a woman, a monk or a pelican." — Alexis Rotella, editor of Prune Juice : A Journal of Senryu and Kyoka


"Take Five is like Dave Brubeck's famous long jazz piece of the same name: both simple and complex, with varied rhythms that can make fingers snap and hips sway. Beguiling for the beginner and expert alike." — George Swede, editor of Frogpond : The Journal of the Haiku Society of America


"It seems that with every turn – whether it be picking up the latest tanka journal, navigating your way to tanka sites across the web or checking out a new entry from one of the ever-growing number of tanka bloggers – that these small but perfectly formed poems continue to offer us some of the most breathtaking moments in contemporary poetry. It’s nothing short of spellbinding to behold a new tanka, its five-lines engraved in the granite of an ancient form of literature but with all the freshness of a green leaf showing. Today, writers are leaving their tanka ajar – in these brief moments of poetry, anything is possible and everything is welcome – and, as a result, tanka is able to thrive across the globe. As writers of tanka embrace the modern world, the modern world embraces tanka.

"Take Five: Best Contemporary Tanka succeeds in providing a comprehensive illustration of the state of modern tanka. Here we have a veritable feast of the finest individual tanka, tanka sequences and tanka prose published over the last year, handpicked from every nook and cranny by an editorial board that consists of some of the most highly respected figures in the field. Take Five is, at once, a satisfying digest of quality tanka and an indispensable tanka handbook for new and experienced writers of the form. With an extensive and absorbing introduction from the chief editor of the anthology, M. Kei, the book is not only a literary treat but an essential addition to the poetry shelf of reader and writer alike." -- Liam Wilkinson, Editor, 3 Lights Gallery