tanka

American  

[tahng-kuh] / ˈtɑŋ kə /

noun

Prosody.

plural

tankas, tanka

1. a Japanese poem consisting of 31 syllables in 5 lines, with 5 syllables in the first and third lines and 7 in the others.

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tanka British  

/ ˈtɑːŋkə /

noun

1. a Japanese verse form consisting of five lines, the first and third having five syllables, the others seven

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Etymology

Origin of tanka

1915–20; < Japanese < Middle Chinese, equivalent to Chinese duǎn short + gē song; cf. renga

Explanation

A tanka is a short Japanese poem with a total of 31 syllables. Traditionally, a tanka was written in one long line, but it's more common to find today's version divided into five lines. A tanka is a slightly longer version of the more familiar haiku. Most tankas take the form of five lines divided into five, seven, five, seven, and seven syllables — if you feel hampered by the typical three brief lines of a haiku, you should try writing a tanka instead. In the 8th century AD, a tanka was simply a short poem (it means "short song" in Japanese), but the term was revived and modernized in the early 1900s.

Example Sentences

His haiku and tanka translations influenced Pound, Rexroth, and others.

From The New Yorker • Sep. 9, 2019

As in the poetic form he preferred, the tanka, Miyazawa also closely observes the shifting landscape.

From New York Times • Nov. 9, 2018

Whatever, it’s a variation on the ancient Japanese poetry called tanka, which are, roughly, 31-syllable poems in five lines; they begin with 5-7-5, as haiku do, then have two more lines of seven syllables each.

From Washington Post • Nov. 5, 2015

The Lakota called the animal igmu tanka, “the great cat.” Puma concolor is its official taxonomic designation, but it has gone by many other names through the centuries: cougar, catamount, puma, wildcat, panther, shadow cat, painter.

From Salon • Mar. 9, 2014

Some one would utter the first three lines of a tanka and some one else would cap the composition by adding the last two.

From Japanese Prints by Lathrop, Dorothy Pulis