Tanka Writing Roundtable • Spring 2024
Dr. Randy Brooks

Forget Me Not

by
Sophie Nicholson

Before this class, I had not really written poetry for several years. I find myself intimidated by a lot of poetic forms, which seem sprawling and difficult to control. They alternately give too much constraint or not enough guidelines.

Tanka has presented me with a happy medium. The form has constraints mainly only on length—“five phrases in five lines.” The way that tanka can be like bite-sized poems has made them easier for me to sink my teeth into. I’ve rekindled some poetic purpose in writing my own tanka.

The tanka in this collection are a combination of memories from childhood, high school, and college. They are real things and imagined things and dreams and modifications or exaggerations of thoughts and feelings and true events. In writing tanka, I strove not just to capture these moments, but to capture something of myself. I wanted to get what was inside of me outside of me. To put that on a page.

And to make those things memorable, both to me and to my readers. I’ve tried to weave vivid imagery, interesting turns of phrases, double meanings, and precise language throughout my tanka. I wanted to leave a mark here—something more solid than just the pictures in my head. So this is “forget me not.”

an early memory
sandcastle swallowed
by the waves
back when someone bigger
always held my hand

fever flushed cheeks
bundled in blankets
calling out to mom
for the medicine
only she can give

sidewalk chalk
on a summer driveway
the pastel colors
of an evening
well-spent

sunlit tulips
nod their heads
in the park
her favorite flower
like my sisters

tying a clover necklace
for all who ask
this is how i’ll make
the other girls
my friends

your smile, my smile
our pinkies intertwined
forget me not
the flower
in my daydream

The pink blossom tree
a favorite in childhood
chopped down yesterday.
Now where
will the fairies live?

fairy figurine
on my ceiling
glitters in lamplight
I swear
she winked

polish flakes
off my nails
like an old house
I’m ready for
a new coat of paint

leave the house
one final time
suitcase full of
corduroy and candle wax
all the things I love

take my picture
develop me
in glossy black and white
I want to be more solid
than my shadow

all out of words
I’ll drink the inkwell
if it gives me
something
to write about

dark crosswalk
keys biting the skin
between my fingers
will I ever feel safe
walking my own street?

my shoe loose
walking home from the bar
arm around your shoulder
I’m lovesick
on the sidewalk

saccharine hearts
chalky and pink
I place one in your palm
saying BE MINE
     you don’t argue.

a bucket full
of strawberries
you place
the ripest one
in my patient mouth

mascara on my cheeks
from the night before
all my problems unsolvable
or I just
need a shower

orange bottles
everywhere
a reminder
my normal is never
coming back

late at night
I get on
the wrong train
going away
from you

thick oil paint
on museum canvas
I could live my life
among
the brush strokes

the textbooks never
did him justice
a real-life Rothko
shows me orange
for the first time

I save
every card
she sends me
the love of my life
in one shoebox

we drive home
through the first
green of spring
on the radio
crimson & clover

laughing in
her Pontiac
strawberry milkshakes
never tasted
so good

Irish pub
I finish your Guinness
always willing
to take bitter things
off your hands

walking the green river
after a holiday
the two of us
our own
parade

forget-me-nots
caress my ankles
along the forest path . . .
a melody
i almost remember

two roads diverged
and so we part
without you
it’s a long walk
home