Tanka: Doris Kasson

Doris Kasson: Tanka

when i ask
if she ever skipped rope
as a child
she tells me how it was
skipping childhood

world blanketed
in a spring fog
i wonder
if i have already said
all that i have to say

they stroll
in front of me
her buttocks wobbling
his left arm
dangling

shaking my hand
his look of disdain
I wonder what she did
the girl
who looks like me

(American Tanka, Issue 9, Fall 2000)

arranging her girth
over the kitchen sink
she tells me again
where i came from
how far i can go

(American Tanka, Issue 8, Spring 2000)

Doris Kasson was born in 1925 in Petersburg, Nebraska, and currently makes her home in Belleair Bluffs, Florida. Her tanka are noteworthy for their crisp wisdom, thought, and careful observation of behavior and human psychology, delivered in a distinct, contemporary voice, tone, and mood. Kasson is one of the featured poets in The Tanka Anthology edited by Michael McClintock, Pamela Miller Ness, and Jim Kacian (Red Moon Press 2003).