Poem in The Mozzie

The Mozzie has published Andrew’s poem, “Windbell with Bamboos” in Vol 27, Issue 6, August 2019. “Windbell with Bamboos” is a suite of 3 tanka that is included in Andrew’s recent collection, Distillations of Different Lands.

“Windbells with Bamboos” is a tanka suite rather than a tanka sequence, as each tanka is a self-contained poem. Nonetheless, placed together the poems make something larger than themselves.

Windbell with Bamboos

        1
Verve

I see it again
in the sacred trinkets stall
at Inari Shrine—
the little windbell voicing
its verve on my veranda.

        2
Relocation

I dangled it there
among the Buddha bamboos
in the shiftless air—
the windbell that days before
had dinged too much by my door.

        3
Unintended

It’s not quite what I
wanted when I hung the wind-
bell in the bamboos:
they cherished it as their own
and coddled to death its tone.

          © Andrew Lansdown