Home » cho 17.1 | Apr. 2021 Table of Contents » Jenny Ward Angyal, Karma

Jenny Ward Angyal

Karma

Limping through the grocery store somewhere between beans and butter, I stifle a gasp of pain and stop short in the middle of an intersection. I’m blocking traffic and people look askance at me from behind their masks.  But in the bony arch of my left foot, no cartilage cushions the rasp and grind of certain worn-out joints. 

cuneiform bones—
their ghostly images
reveal
an ancient message
inscrutable as pain

‘No telling,’ the doctor had said, in response to my pointless ‘why’ query. ‘Maybe it’s from an old injury.’

brushing
the dust of fifty years
from the crystal ball
of memory . . .
the sweet scent of hay

Lead rope in hand, I am standing in the bed of a livestock truck. I coax and cluck and offer carrots, but the chestnut mare called Butterfly doesn’t trust the rickety wooden ramp. Instead, she makes a prodigious leap three feet straight up into the back of the truck. . . landing squarely on my foot.

no such thing
as a separate self—
one gentle tug
and a jeweled net opens
under the echoing stars

About the Author

Jenny Ward Angyal’s tanka have appeared widely in journals and in her collection, moonlight on water  (2016). She is tanka editor of Under the Basho.

4 thoughts on “<strong>Jenny Ward Angyal</strong>, Karma”

  1. A masterful piece – seamlessly meshing the present with the past. I love the way the second tanka links to the prose that comes after. So many phrases appeal to me – ‘somewhere between beans and butter’ – the description of the injury’s ‘rasp and grind’. Both the tanka shift and link, making for a very satisfying read.
    Thank you

    Reply
  2. “Karma” is wonderfully engaging with the seamless meshing of the present to the past as Liz comments on. Thank you, Jenny.

    Reply

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