What's New. Information on upcoming reading performance, newly issued books and more. Mariko Kitakubo

Mariko Kitakubo Profile

Mariko Kitakubo

Born in Tokyo.
Living in Mitaka-city, Tokyo
Membership
Japan Writers' Association,
Japan PEN Club,
Association of Contemporary Tanka Poets,
Japan Tanka Poets' Society,
Kokoro-No-Hana,
Tanka Society of America.
Tan-Ku Co-Founder
Tan-Ku Association, president

In commemoration of
15 years of tanka reading
The Latest Tanka Sequence
Original Tanka presented at
Spoken World Live

Contemprary Tanka Poet Mariko Kitakubo.
お知らせ

20201028_01-min.jpg
October 28 4:00 p.m. PST (Oct. 29 8:00 a.m. Japan Time), I participated in Wednesday Poetry Zoom Meeting presided at by Ms. Kathabela Wilson.

This time, I was in Kumobaike in Karuizawa, one of the famous resort in Japan, surrounded by autumn leaves and performed reading of new Tanka sequence.
20201028_02-min.jpg
Although it was my first trial to attend the meeting from the outside via a smart phone, it worked out better than I imagined.

I was glad that all the fellow members appreciated my performance.
20201028_03-min.jpg
 

Thursday, October 29, 2020

20201021_01-min.jpg
October 21 4:00 p.m. PST (Oct. 22 8:00 a.m. Japan Time), I participated in Wednesday Poetry Zoom Meeting presided at by Ms. Kathabela Wilson, and performed reading of new and short Tanka sequence.
20201021_02-min.jpg
As autumn is the best season for arts, each participants presented their unique and creative paintings, pictures, music and poems. The meeting of 2 hours and a half was very meaningful time for me.
20201021_03-min.jpg
I would like to thank for everyone.
20201021_05-min_r2.jpg
 
20201021_04-min.jpg
This is the hanging scroll of calligraphy written by my late grandfather, Masashi Tanaka 88 years ago. It shows a part of "Hyoya-no-Uta" (or "Hisago-no-Uta") created by Touko Fujita.
My grandfather was a scientist and calligraphy was his hobby. After he passed away, our relatives made it the scroll. The calligraphy was written when he temporarily left the company to his subordinate due to health problem.
I heard that my grandfather was saying he could not write as good as he expected.
I sincerely hope that he allows his granddaughter displays the scroll after all these years.

Friday, October 23, 2020

September 30, 10:00 a.m., Japan Time (Sept. 29, 6:00 p.m., PST), I hosted the 15th Anniversary event on Zoom to celebrate my bilingual Tanka reading activity overseas to introduce Tanka to the world.

Although it was the prime time of Pacific Standard Time and the U.S. Presidential Debate was on air, I am very glad that many audience viewed my one-hour-and-half online event.

In the event, I presented ten sequences in total - four of which I created with Ms. Deborah P. Kolodji in 2020 during the time we suffer from corona virus pandemic, one with Ms. Kathabela Wilson, and five created by myself. I am greatly honored by audience's very favorable comments and reaction.

Please enjoy the video of my event on my website which contains already published pieces.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude toward Ms. Deborah P. Kolodji, who have made a great contribution to the planning and implementation of this event, and Mr. & Mrs. Wilson, who offered wonderful background music with Tambura, Shakuhachi, and Indian flute. I would also like to thank Ms. Yvette, Ms. Deborah's daughter, for sending information to the audience in advance.

I am planning to host the same event for the different time zone so that audience in India, Tanzania, England and other European regions can enjoy my performance.

20200930_01-min.jpg

 

20200930_02-min.jpg

 

20200930_03-min.jpg

20200930_04-min.jpg

I am sorry but no pictures are available for the people joined the event in the middle.

Tuesday, October 20, 2020

November 16 & 17, EST, I will participate in Bridgewater International Poetry Festival Fall 2020 Virtual Event. I will perform Tanka reading in 5-minute movie.

For the details of the event, please click the image below to refer to their Facebook Page.

BridgewaterInternationalPoetryFest2020-min.jpg

Thursday, October 15, 2020

20201014_01-min.jpg
October 14, 4:00 p.m. PST (Oct. 15, 8:00 p.m. Japan Time), I participated in Wednesday Poetry Zoom Meeting, and performed Japanese-English bilingual Tanka reading.

Wednesday, October 14, 2020

20201012_01-min.jpg
October 11 at 4:30 p.m., PST (Oct. 12 at 8:30 a.m., Japan Time), I participated in Zoom Reading Event presided at by Ms. Maja Trochimczyk and performed reading of my English Tanka sequence "Borderless Prayer," which was published in "WE ARE HERE: VILLAGE POETS ANTHOLOGY".
20201012_02-min.jpg
It was their 10th Anniversary of their virtual event, and I was very honored to be a part of the event together with the other poets whose poems were published in the same anthology.
20201012_03-min.jpg
Below is the quote from their website:

FLINTRIDGE BOOKSTORE PRESENTS VIRTUAL CELEBRATION OF 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF VILLAGE POETS READINGS.

WE ARE HERE: VILLAGE POETS ANTHOLOGY

MAJA TROCHIMCZYK & MARLENE HITT, EDITORS

Monday, October 12, 2020

Having received an invitation on Oct. 4 from Ms. Vessislava Savova, a poet and one of my best friends, I am currently participating poetry marathon in Facebook.

It is an 8-day project in which all participants post one piece of own poem per day while inviting 2 poets. Poems posted in this project will be translated into Russian and get published in Russian Almanac.

20201009_day8-min.jpg

20201009_day7-min.jpg

20201009_day6-min.jpg

20201008_day5-min.jpg

20201007_day4-min.jpg

20201006_day3-min.jpg

20201005_day2-min.jpg

20201004_day1-min.jpg

Thursday, October 8, 2020

I am very honored that some of my Tanka were read aloud at Collingswood Book Festival event brought by the Collingswood Book Festival and Nick Virgilio Writers House on October 3rd PST.

I am very glad that I received this great news on my birthday. What a coincidence!

My sincere gratitude toward my dearest friend Ms. Robin Palley, and Nick Vilgilio Writers House.

(click the image below to view the Nick Virgilio Haiku Association's event FB page.)

20200103_NVHA_01-min.jpg

Wednesday, October 7, 2020

The newsletter volume 19 of "Writers association aiming for abondoning-nuclear-power society" (President: Mr. Otohiko Kaga) issued in October 2020 posted my essay "Kokoro no Arikata (the State of Mind)".

Having an agreement from Mr. Yukitsuna Sasaki, who presides "Kokoro no Hana", a Tanka association I belong to, I quoted some pieces of Tanka from Mr. Sasaki's anthology, "Teo ga Kita Hi (The day Theo became my family member)."

Although a piece of Tanka is supposed to be written in one line as in the original, it had to devide a piece into two lines due to the limitation of number of characters per line. I sincerely apologize for it.

20201005_01-min.jpg

Excerpt from the newsletter
(click the image below to read the article in enlarged size)

20201005_02-min.jpg

20201005_03-min.jpg

Tuesday, October 6, 2020

To celebrate my 15 years of International Tanka Performance, I am going to host a special Online Reading event on Zoom organized by Ms. Deborah P Kolodji.

Date & Time: Tues. Sept 29, 6 PM in US California time (Sept 30,10 am in Japan time).

Friday, September 25, 2020