Examples How to Submit Award Highlights Tips and Resources

Clare MacQueen, founding editor of MacQueen’s Quinterly, is especially interested in these three poetic hybrids. In particular, works which include elements of fiction as well as “faction,” pieces that use story-telling techniques such as dialogue and even plot, and incorporate more embellishment than journalistic reportage.

Amen to these words from Bob Lucky, former content editor at Contemporary Haibun Online (aka cho):

“...as an editor, I read a lot of haibun that is just one damn fact after another. Memoir and autobiography are the trickiest bits of nonfiction around because in order to tell the Truth you have to lie. There is artifice in art.”

—Quoted with permission from “Random Praise: Tim Gardiner’s ‘Skeleton Wood’” (cho, July 2017)

To give you an idea of what Clare’s looking for, a few dozen examples follow. They are listed first by the rare forms, cheribun and tanka tales, followed by haibun and haibun stories. Many of these works include various degrees of artfulness and sometimes a bit of humor to tell their Truths, and a good number of them resonate deeply:

---

1. Cynthia Anderson: The Mom and Dad Show: Episode 21,900 [cheribun]
   
   
2. Tina Barry: Cemetery, Castine, Maine [cheribun]
   
   
3. Tina Barry: I am from Pennsylvania USA   my please    how about you! [found cheribun, very rare]
   
   
4. Roy J. Beckemeyer: The Gardener’s Caesura [cheribun]
   
   
5. Margaret Dornaus: The Writer’s Cabin [the prototype, and MacQ’s first cheribun]
   
   
6. Hazel Hall: Ghosts of Gershwin [cheribun story; opens with a cherita and closes with two, a rarity]
   
   
7. Hazel Hall: Her Morning Walk [cheribun story, and unique triple-form hybrid: prose poem + open-field free verse + cherita]
   
   
8. Oz Hardwick: Last Ride in the Dead Zone [cheribun]
   
   
9. Peter Jastermsky: Fishboy [cheribun story]
   
   
10. Gary S. Rosin: Birthdays of the Dead [second-person cheribun, rare*]
    
    
11. Tracy Royce: Open and Shut [second-person cheribun, rare*]
    
    
12. Jane Salmons: White-bellied Heron [cheribun story]
    
    
13. Scott Wiggerman: Brothers by Blood [braided cheribun]
    
    

*A rarity of ~5.4% (only six second-person pieces appear amongst the total of 111 cheribun published in MacQ from January 2022 through September 2026).

---

1. Cynthia Anderson: The Psychic [tanka tale]
   
   
2. Claire Everett: #SkylarkLivesMatter [tanka prose]
   
   
3. Keith Evetts: Paranoia [tanka prose]
   
   
4. Colleen M. Farrelly and Cynthia Bale: Residuum [tanku-bun]
   
   
5. Gerry Jacobson: The Isolation [tanka prose]
   
   
6. Michael H. Lester: Familiar, Yet Forgotten [tanka prose]
   
   
7. Bob Lucky: Preface to Canto IV of The Three Virgins of Rosenberg, Texas [tanka tale]
   
   
8. Kate MacQueen: In substance [tanka prose]
   
   
9. Vaishnavi Ramaswamy: Transmigration [tanka prose]
   
   
10. Kala Ramesh: Mirage [tanka prose, anomalous]
    
    
11. Charles D. Tarlton: Weight as Such [tanka tale]
    
    
12. Beverly A. Tift: The Arcane Art of Sky Writing [OWP tanka prose]
    
    
13. Tony Steven Williams: So glad to be here [tanka prose]
    
    

---

The following pieces are haibun:

1. E. L. Blizzard: From a Poet to a Painter [ekphrastic haibun sequence]
   
   
2. Eugene Datta: Elina
   
   
3. Colleen M. Farrelly: #Decoding Perimenopause [with code-ku]
   
   
4. Kat Lehmann: Two Days Before She Dies [ekphrastic]
   
   
5. Mark Meyer:
   (±)-2-Methyl-1,2,3,4,10,14b-hexahydropyrazino[2,1-a]pyrido[2,3-c][2]benzazepine
   
   
6. Jacqueline Pearce: Holding On [ekphrastic]
   
   
7. Elisabeth Preston-Hsu: Ache, with pollen and kink [burning haibun, erotic]
   
   
8. Andrew Riutta: Prayer
   
   
9. Alexis Rotella: After My Mother’s Burial [micro]
   
   
10. Carla Schwartz: Shower Adjustments at the Castle in the Clouds [rare form: micro pantoubun]
    
    
11. Daryl Scroggins: Morning Ritual
    
    
12. Stuart Watson: Magicians
    
    
13. Lew Watts: Flat Pack [concrete]
    
    

---

These pieces are haibun stories:

1. Mikki Aronoff: Tangle and Split
   
   
2. Jerome Berglund: Tornado Drill
   
   
3. Chuck Brickley: Even With Adam
   
   
4. Keith Evetts: Rediscovery of America [humour]
   
   
5. Jennifer L. Freed: Today, Tomorrow, Always
   
   
6. Terri L. French: Trashed
   
   
7. Joan Leotta: Adam offers apples to tempt the Land Girls as told to me by the London-born one. [ekphrastic]
   
   
8. Stella Pierides: Noir [A Triptych]
   
   
9. Keith Polette: A Burrito with Bashō
   
   
10. Charmaine Smith: River Music
    
    
11. Harriot West: Posing for Degas [ekphrastic]
    
    
12. Mary White: Threshold
    
    
13. LL Wohlwend: Priceless [braided, ekphrastic]
    
    

---

Just below the next section, you’ll find a list of 24 haibun that were first published in MacQueen’s Quinterly and subsequently selected for anthology and Touchstone Awards.

For those who would like to explore a range of 30 haibun varieties, please see The Haibun Zoo: A Guide to Current Rare Haibun Forms by Colleen M. Farrelly in Issue 30X of MacQueen’s Quinterly (December 2025).

---

How to Submit Cheribun, Haibun, and Tanka Tales:

Electronic submissions are strongly preferred, via MacQ’s Submittable page. Clare MacQueen is a one-person production army with chronic illnesses to manage as well—and emailed submissions are likely to get lost in her backlogged inbox. Using Submittable is the best way to help her keep things organized, so she can respond to submissions more quickly (i.e., within 60 days).

The next reading period will open in early October 2026. Submissions will be considered for Issue 35 of MacQueen’s Quinterly, which will launch in late November, and for the streamlined MacQ, Issue 2027.1, launching in mid-January 2027.

For cheribun, haibun, and tanka tales, the maximum word count per piece is 500, including the title, prose, and micro-poem verses, as well as any epigraphs and/or author footnotes.

The free-submit link (aka the no-fee link for Solicited Mss.) will be available for a limited number of poets writing in these forms. To place your name on the list to receive the link:

• Please contact Clare: macquinterly [at] gmail [dot] com
  
  
• In the subject header of your email, please include: “Request for free-submit link”
  
  
• While Clare may be unable to answer individual emails, she plans to send out the free-submit link in a group email, with blind cc’s to protect everyone’s privacy, around the 8th of October. Submissions will be open for Solicited Mss. from 11-17 October.
  
  

Clare’s looking for polished writing, with an eye toward nominating notable works for annual awards such as Best Small Fictions, Best of the Net, the Pushcart Prize, the Red Moon Anthologies (including Contemporary Haibun), and The Touchstone Award for Individual Haibun.

She’s thrilled to report the following Award Highlights, listed in alpha order by author’s last name:

---

1. Cynthia Anderson’s haibun story Formerly Known as Ion was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
   
   
2. Roberta Beary’s Grief: The Uncut Version was among the four recipients of The Touchstone Awards for Individual Haibun 2024; and was reprinted in the anthology Contemporary Haibun 20.
   
   
3. Roberta Beary’s haibun Dad Says was reprinted in upside down: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2023.
   
   
4. Rose Mary Boehm’s haibun The Ashes of Ukraine was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 19.
   
   
5. Glenn G. Coats’ haibun Headstream was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
   
   
6. Cherie Hunter Day’s haibun 42R Mill Street was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
   
   
7. Margaret Dornaus’ ekphrastic haibun Le Rêve was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
   
   
8. Lynn Edge’s haibun story Year of the Farrier was reprinted in two anthologies: Contemporary Haibun 19 and Best Small Fictions 2024.
   
   
9. Claire Everett’s haibun A Thousand Thens was among the four recipients of The Touchstone Awards for Individual Haibun 2023.
   
   
10. Emily Fortney’s anomalous haibun Finding My Belly Button was long-listed for The Touchstone Awards for Individual Haibun 2024.
    
    
11. Jonathan Humphrey’s haibun story NASA Gives Spiders, Insects LSD was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
    
    
12. Maureen Kingston’s haibun Anniversary was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 19.
    
    
13. Kat Lehmann’s anomalous haibun Sensory Deprivation Tank was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 19.
    
    
14. Bob Lucky’s haibun The Portuguese Lessons Finally Pay Off was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 20.
    
    
15. Bob Lucky’s haibun sequence “Scribble Away: Notes from Bahrain, March 2022” was shortlisted for The Touchstone Awards for Individual Haibun 2022.
    
    
16. Bob Lucky’s haibun Verisimilitude was reprinted in two anthologies: Contemporary Haibun 19 and upside down: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2023.
    
    
17. Richard L. Matta’s haibun Uncle Eddie’s Falcon was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 19.
    
    
18. Mark Meyer’s haibun Texas Requiem was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 19.
    
    
19. Peter Newton’s haibun story Modern Gothic was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 18.
    
    
20. Peter Newton’s braided haibun story Rosebud was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 18.
    
    
21. Kelly Sargent’s haibun Birds of a Feather was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 20.
    
    
22. Lew Watts’ anomalous haibun Cruising Downtown Santa Fe was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
    
    
23. Rich Youmans’ braided haibun Through the Looking Glass was reprinted in Contemporary Haibun 17.
    
    
24. Rich Youmans’ anomalous haibun What’s Underneath was among the four recipients of The Touchstone Awards for Individual Haibun 2023.
    
    

The 24 haibun above are among 35 originally published in MacQueen’s Quinterly and subsequently reprinted across four issues (17 thru 20) of the Contemporary Haibun anthology, published by Red Moon Press.

(For links to nomination lists, see MacQ’s Anthology Awards Portal.)

---

The following five haibun stories were first published in KYSO Flash (predecessor to MacQueen’s Quinterly):

• Camouflage by Charles Hansmann, published in Issue 3 (aka KF-3), was reprinted in The Best Small Fictions 2016 anthology (aka TBSF); and The Current Situation by Bob Lucky (from KF-4) was among the finalists listed in TBSF 2016.
  
  
• Picking Sunflowers for Van Gogh by Harriot West, published in KF-6, was reprinted in The Best Small Fictions 2017; and Hackmuth’s Mannequin Dream by Dan Gilmore (from KF-5) was among the finalists listed in TBSF 2017.
  
  
• After the Dream, the Dream Remains by Rich Youmans, published in KF-11, was reprinted in The Best Small Fictions 2020.
  
  

---

Tips and Resources:

Those to whom these forms are new may be surprised to learn that:

• The plural of haibun is haibun, and “...the plural of haiku is haiku (think sheep and fish)...”
  
  Which is also true for cheribun and tanka: the plural is spelled the same as the singular.
  
  
• “...syllable counting is not at all an essential element to writing haiku well,” as poet and editor Lynne Rees writes (see link to her conference paper a few paragraphs below).
  
  

Here at MacQueen’s Quinterly, Clare happily agrees: No need to adhere to the 5-7-5 syllabic structure—especially when doing so results in stilted or unnatural-sounding lines and/or unnecessary words.

Despite the ubiquitous, over-simplified definition of the haiku as an unrhymed poem consisting of 17 syllables arranged in three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables respectively, syllable count is not the defining factor. Three other elements are more important.

Effective haiku (1) convey a single moment of insight, (2) use concrete imagery, and (3) include two juxtaposing parts. All of this within a very compact space. Preferably one breath, which in English is 10-14 syllables.

For instance, this seven-syllable poem (1-3-3) by Nick Virgilio (1928–1989) first published in American Haiku (1963):

bass
picking bugs
off the moon

And this 12-syllable gem (3-4-5) by Roberta Beary, Clare’s all-time favorite haiku ever:

all day long
I feel its weight
the unworn necklace

(From Beary’s debut collection of haiku, The Unworn Necklace, now in its fifth printing and published by Snapshot Press. See also her micro-essay on craft, in which she discusses this haiku.)

Of course, 5-7-5 can also produce lovely and effective haiku! Clare admires quite a few by Gary S. Rosin, in particular his ekphrastic poems and collaborative shahai published in MacQ. Here’s just a handful of examples:

1. (a shiver of moon)
   
   
2. (empty)
   
   
3. Floating (with Jana Craighead Smith)
   
   
4. Hey! (with Katherine Durham Oldmixon)
   
   
5. (origami cranes)
   
   
6. (whispers in the air)
   
   

See also this sequence of 5-7-5 haiku by William Cullen, Jr.: Driving Cross Country, still a timely commentary (sad to say) nine years after its initial publication.

Recommended reading about writing haiku:

1. The Haiku Foundation’s series New to Haiku: Advice for Beginners is posted every two to three weeks and features interviews with, and essays by, established haiku poets. Two recent examples:
   
   Charlotte Digregorio Interviews Haiku Poet & Educator Mark Forrester (19 July 2026)
   
   The Accidental Haiku Poet: An Essay by David Green (5 July 2026), a fascinating account of a New Year’s resolution that “quickly morphed into a passion.” Be sure not to miss the photo of Green toward the end!
   
   
2. Haiku: a poetry of absence or an absence of poetry? (subtitled “Minimalism in Contemporary English Language Haiku”), a paper by poet and editor Lynne Rees presented at the PALA (Poetics and Linguistics Association) 2015 Conference at Canterbury University, Kent, United Kingdom (16 July 2015).
   
   The author’s goals, in part: to “illustrate that haiku can be, or should be muscular enough to withstand scrutiny, close reading” and to “expunge their reputation as mainstream poetry’s country bumpkin cousin: naïve and embarrassing to have around in sophisticated company.”

Recommended resources by expert practitioners of haibun and/or tanka prose:

1. Haibun: A Writer’s Guide by Roberta Beary, Lew Watts, and Rich Youmans; reviewed by Ce Rosenow in Issue 24 of MacQueen’s Quinterly (August 2024)
   
   
2. Plaiting Poem & Prose: The Art of Braided Haibun by Rich Youmans in contemporary haibun online (Issue 18.2, August 2022)
   
   
3. Why I Write Haibun, or The Holy Trinity of Haibun, essay and haibun by Roberta Beary in the debut issue of MacQueen’s Quinterly (1 January 2020); Beary is the long-time haibun editor at Modern Haiku and the co-author, with Lew Watts and Rich Youmans, of Haibun: A Writer’s Guide, listed above.
   
   
4. 25 Tanka Prose: Introduction: TP or not TP, That Is the Question by Bob Lucky in contemporary haibun online (17:3, December 2021); reprinted from Atlas Poetica: A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka (July 2011).
   
   
5. Modern English-Language Haibun by Ray Rasmussen in KYSO Flash (Issue 5, Spring 2016); the author compares the haibun’s similarities and differences to flash fiction, short stories, and prose poetry in this excerpt from his collection of haibun, Landmarks (2015).
   
   
6. A Game of Tag: Gary LeBel on Tanka Prose, an interview by Patricia Prime in Haibun Today (Vol. 6, No. 3, September 2012), in which LeBel says that his works are “a mix of personal experience, thumbnail sketch, pure fiction, fantasy, boldface lie, story and/or myth (and often more than a pinch of hyperbole)...”
   
   
7. And finally, by J. Zimmerman, a summarized history of prose-with-poetry works in Classical, Modern, and Contemporary Japanese literary traditions; article includes references and a list of suggested readings: What English-Language Haibun Poets Can Learn From Japanese Practices: the Mysteries of an Almost-Heard Birdsong First Autumn Abroad in Contemporary Haibun Online (Vol. 9, No. 4, January 2014)
   

MacQ’s Submission Manager