Tanka is a short poem, five lines instead of haiku’s three, and its own vocabulary comes with it: kami-no-ku for the upper three lines, shimo-no-ku for the lower two, waka for the older name the form carried through most of its life. These six pages are what we have built to teach tanka properly, from a plain definition through the craft it actually takes to write one well.
Start with What Is Tanka? if the form is new to you. It lays out the shape, the 5-7-5-7-7 syllable pattern, and our Tanka Recipe for finding a poem’s pivot line. How to Write a Tanka turns that recipe into steps you can follow on your own page. Tanka Techniques and Tanka vs Haiku go deeper once the basics hold, one into craft and one into the neighboring form poets confuse it with. A Short History of Tanka traces the form from the eighth-century Man’yōshū to Takuboku and beyond, and Tanka Books and Resources points toward what is worth reading next.
Work through them in order, or jump straight to whichever gap you are missing.
Learn the form
- What Is Tanka? — the form, the 5-7-5-7-7 pattern, the Tanka Recipe, and four annotated examples.
- How to Write a Tanka — a step-by-step guide: the pivot line, drafting exercises, and revision.
- Tanka Techniques — Fujiwara Teika’s ten tanka styles, each with a classical and a modern example.
- Tanka vs Haiku — the two forms side by side, and how to tell which one you are actually writing.
History and further reading
- A Short History of Tanka — thirteen centuries of the form, from the Man’yōshū to tanka in English.
- Tanka Books and Resources — books, journals, and organizations for tanka poets.