Contemprary Tanka Poet Mariko Kitakubo.

On May 28, an online poetry journal "Scarlet Dragonfly Journal" published "Lego Box." It is an English tanka & haiku sequence I created together with Ms. Debora P. Kolodji, my best friend haiku poet.

My sincere thanks to the editor, Ms. Kathleen Trocmet.

Lego Box

tiny pieces
become
our world. . .
picking up only
innocent elements　(M)

kaleidoscopes
of brightly colored pieces
Starry Night in 3-D (D)

passion
of the vortex
still there
in the deep sky
Vincent Van Gogh (M)

swirling blocks
in circular patterns
childhood artist (D)

release
from a spiral
labyrinth
a flying ladybird
summer morning (M)

follow
the yellow brick road
Lego box (D)

— Mariko Kitakubo, Japan / Deborah P Kolodji, USA

 <Message from Ms. Deborah P. Kolodji>

Collaborative poetry has been especially fun and inspiring during this pandemic/post-pandemic age we have been living through, isolated from everyone. Since Covid hit in 2020, I've been writing tanka/haiku sequences with my good friend, Mariko Kitakubo, from Tokyo.

She writes tanka and I write haiku and we inspire each other. Due to the time difference, it is often very late at night either here in LA or in Tokyo when our creativity blossoms. She might write a tanka before she goes to bed, then I see it when I wake up. When I'm about to go to bed, we're at our most productive since it's in the middle of the afternoon (tomorrow) in Tokyo at that time.

Last summer, I went to the Lego art exhibit, "The Art of the Brick," at the California Science Center with Yvette and sent Mariko some photos. She was inspired to write a tanka, which inspired me to write a haiku and the rest is history. "Lego Box" was published in the Scarlet Dragonfly Journal yesterday:
https://scarletdragonflyjournal.wordpress.com/.../lego-box/

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