T.A.P. (Tanka Anime Poetry) Tag — Creativity Where Art Thou

“When they say creativity is pain, they definitely know what they’re talking about.”  — Chizu

So… Moya welcomed me back. The real question here is: am I really back? But for The Moyatorium, I’m back for a bit. Thanks for the tag!

Even though poetry has never been my strong suit, I’ll give this one a go. Just for fun and first times. No offense to the tanka experts. Okay… now I’m actually worried about this.

But first, for those who have no clue what a Tanka is (like me) here’s the tag creator’s original post: Introducing Haiku’s Poetic Cousin. Or you can refer to the copy pasted short explanation here:

What is a tanka, you ask?

Tanka (短歌 tan-kah) are short poems that originated in Japan in the 13th century. They are five lines long and often convey deep feelings about nature, love, or desire. They usually have a structure of syllables that starts similar to haiku (5-7-5), but ends with two more 7-syllable lines, making it 5-7-5-7-7, for a total of 31 syllables.

For a TL;DR, here’s the structure of a tanka.

• Setting up the scene (two lines that describe a moment)
• The “pivot” line (middle line that links the top and bottom lines together)
• The payoff (last two lines that describe your feelings toward said moment)

Rules of the tag:

1. Headline your post with “The T.A.P. Tag!” and put “tanka” as one of your tags.
2. Make sure to link back to the original post that started the tag.
3. Make sure to mention the person who forced introduced the tag to you!
4. Pick 1-3 of your favorite anime.
5. Write your tanka about the anime you’ve chosen. It’s fine if you decide to do only one or two if the schedule is tight.
6. Tag at least 3 or more bloggers you know, and get their creative muscles flowing.

---

Yuri on Ice (Yuri Plisetsky)

Angry when on land

Truly graceful in mid-air

The ice, his passion

His talent is honed through rage

A swan defined by motion

 

Shingeki no Kyojin: Kuinaki Sentaku (Levi Ackerman)

A boy is conceived

In a dark hole deep under

Death is in his eyes

Desperation in his blood

And survival, his forte

 

Chihayafuru (Wakamiya Shinobu)

A queen stands alone

With mortals’ adoration

She stood unchallenged

The girl’s unrivaled strength shines

But became disenchanted

 

---

And then we proceed to the hardest part of any tag. To find others to bother this with.

Hi friends! Care to do this? I tag: The Aniwriter, Bookish Owlette, Anime Paladine. You can opt not to do this too. No pressure. And I think it’s safe to say, and that the tanka master aka creator of the tag will probably agree, that anyone interested can do this too. Spread the tanka love around!

Fun fact to end this poetry session. Did you know that the act of counting using one’s fingers is also known as dactylonomy? I didn’t before doing this tag. Now I have the tanka gods and goddesses (the one who did this before me) to thank for it. I dactyl– errr.. I counted through my fingers.

In retrospect, it’s amazing to think how many people have done this and tagged others until one awesome blogger tagged me. That chain of events led me to dactylonomy. 

Butterfly effect, right? Amazing.

Thanks for reading!