Lockdown . . . 

	sheltering in place, 
	the acrid smell 
	of home fires. 

The cruelest spring - - -

	alone 
	among the trees, 
	an owl’s call. 

Divided states . . . 

	double-digging dirt, 
	the old pear’s root still 
	sprouting leaves—
	how hard it is to make 
	everything great again. 

Publisher’s Notes:

1. “Tanku sonnet” is our coinage for a new hybrid poetic sequence created by Margaret Dornaus, which is comprised of a braided haiku (three lines), two haiku (three lines each), and a tanka (five lines). The resulting 14-line poem also has a title.
   
   This hybrid differs from the form originating with David Marshall 20 years ago, the structured haiku sonnet, comprised of a title, four haiku of three lines each, and a final couplet. Details and examples are available at Marshall’s website, haiku streak (link retrieved 21 February 2022).
   
   
2. See also this trail-blazing poetic form by Margaret Dornaus, featured in Issue 11: MacQ’s First Cheribun!
   
   

Margaret Dornaus

holds an MFA in the translation of poetry from the University of Arkansas. A semi-finalist in Naugatuck River Review’s 13th annual Narrative Poetry Contest, she had the privilege of editing and publishing a pandemic-themed anthology, Behind the Mask: Haiku in the Time of Covid-19, through her small literary press, Singing Moon, and received a Best of the Net nomination in 2020.

Her first book of poetry, Prayer for the Dead: Collected Haibun & Tanka Prose, received a 2017 Merit Book Award from the Haiku Society of America. Recent poems appear in The Ekphrastic Review, Lindenwood Review, MockingHeart Review, and Red Earth Review, as well as in the tribute series for Lawrence Ferlinghetti, I Am Still Waiting, published by Silver Birch Press.

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Le Rêve, ekphrastic haibun by Margaret Dornaus which was nominated by MacQ for the Red Moon Anthologies, and selected for publication in Contemporary Haibun 17 (Red Moon Press, 2022).