Tanka-prose from Charles Tarlton

30 CARMODY:  I am exactly like a helium balloon.  I swell up or shrink down depending on the surrounding pressure. BLIGHT: [Indicating CARMODY.]  Massive in the rarer atmospheres.  [Pause.]  Unable to descend, as it were, without disfigurement. As a part of our WWII...

Ashley Stokes

Iguanadon A mad woman was squatting in the outer office. I’d unwittingly let in a mad woman. She’d shivered, twitched, looked me up and down and then insisted Johnny Havelock appraise the contents of her battered flat case. I’d been standing at Johnny’s … Mister...

To Mark International Women’s Day

You will remain an example I will walk with all walking people And no I will not stand still Just to watch the passers by This is my Homeland In which I have A palm tree A drop in a cloud And a grave to protect me This is more beautiful Than all cities of fog And...

Lorraine McGuire

Jason’s Last Supper I have flavoured myself with mandrake and honeysuckle; softened the light; set the table in silks; gathered dew at midnight to wash your feet. I have used the voice of Callas to soothe cares: see how she hangs in the air between us? Trip the...

Kate Noakes

Zonnebloem Hold fast to dreams for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly – Langston Hughes. Let me tell you how I fill my nostrils with home, with the girls at the hairdresser, their teenage primping and perms, pink curlers, hot tongs, or the...