Red Moon Press Publishes New Edition of Annual Print Anthology

The 19th edition of contemporary haibun, the annual print anthology showcasing a state-of-the-art selection of haibun, tanka prose, and haiga from journals around the world, is now available from Red Moon Press.

The new edition is one of the largest yet, with 113 haibun and tanka prose in styles ranging from “classic” formats (a haiku or tanka following one or more paragraphs of prose), to braided haibun, concrete haibun, and pieces influenced by erasure poetry (including “burning haibun,” a tripartite form consisting of a prose poem, an erasure of that prose, and a further erasure to create the poem).

The anthology also includes 32 full-color haiga, from pen-and-ink illustrations to photo haiku to impressionistic paintings and digital renderings.

The editorial team for contemporary haibun 19 comprised Ludmila Balabanova, Tish Davis, Terri L. French, Ron Moss (Haiga Editor), Peter Newton, Ray Rasmussen, Bryan Rickert, and Rich Youmans.

Priced at $25 U.S., the anthology can be purchased from Red Moon Press.

Three sample selections (haibun, tanka prose, and haiga):

Pascal’s Wager

By Deidra Greenleaf Allen

This April morning it was there again, hovering over the patio stairs. At first I didn’t realize it was the same carpenter bee, but after a week I began to see a pattern—how it would position itself over the center of the wooden stairs, wings fanning furiously as it bobbed up and down, then dart off every few seconds before returning to resume its post. I could tell by the white mark on its head that it was a male, probably protecting a female as she prepared her nest tunneled in the wood. When a rival carpenter, or misguided wasp or honeybee, strayed too close, it lunged at them with its compact little body, aggressive as a rugby player. It’s been in the same spot for days now, wholly committed to the importance of its task, though it will not live to see the outcome. 

dawn in Kharkiv
she collects eggs
between shellings

dreamscape

By A.A. Marcoff

an egret comes straight out of a dream its nature its quality is of dreaming itself into being with the light and the white of its wings opening like a Japanese fan as its magic casts a spell upon the water like a moment of snow flowing on the white wind I no longer know whether it is my waking mind that grasps this reality of a bird in flight or whether I too am always in a dream when I behold its light in the simplicity of the beauty of a morning seeing a grace of air and breeze as it glides over the river becoming the reality of dreams and when dawn breaks over the valley it will be time for consciousness and sun to become one great dream in the sky of existence

an egret
glides over the river
in another dream
I might have been
its wings

Haiga by Judith Gorgone

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