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MacQueen’s Quinterly: Knock-your-socks-off Art and Literature
Issue 2: March 2020
Tanka Prose: 95 words
By Tish Davis

Fireflies

 

At summer’s dusk we neighbor kids gather under the outdoor bulb on the pole behind our farmhouse and with hammer and nail vent the lids of any newcomer’s jar.

the path
to the marrow—
the mower’s cut
through what we call ours
curves around the pond

Only two of us are old enough to mow, old enough to secretly saw an arch in the neighbor’s row of osage orange.

sharing secrets
with our fireflies...
after promising
to never tell
we let them go

unrehearsed
that moment when sprinkled
lanterns light
how still
we stand

Tish Davis
Issue 2, March 2020

lives in Northern Ohio. Her haibun, tanka, and related tanka forms have been published in various print and online journals. When she isn’t busy with work and grandchildren, she enjoys exploring the local parks with her husband and three dogs.

 
 
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