Francine Porad

Over the years, so much of Francine Porad's poetry has just stunned me with its imagery and wisdom; she is a master at what I call the short, English-language "wisdom" poem. It is exactly her kind of tanka by which, in the Introduction to The Tanka Anthology (Red Moon Press, 2003), I feel confident enough to stake the English tanka's claim to a new chapter in the short English lyric.

--Michael McClintock