BY JOHN ELLIOTT
cloudless desert
ochre hills, alluvium
dry as my heart —
a ghost flower blooms
in the ribs of a vole
John Elliott is a retired biologist and teacher. He has published poetry in Acorn, The Comstock Review, Southwestern American Literature, Poetry Quarterly, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, Tanka Journal, and the anthologies Buzz, Rare Feathers, To Give Life a Shape.
Process Note: Reflecting on my years living in the Mojave Desert, I wrote this tanka with meaning presented through a few contrasting images as in a Georgia O'Keeffe painting: desert/persistent life; ochre hills/red heart; disappearing vole/new life blooming; dry alluvium/life-bearing heart; a ghost flower (Mohavea confertiflora)/emerging from the dead; dry heart/hope of re-emergence. My first drafts in rigid tanka form evolved in process to a modified tanka. I reflect on process primarily when I’m working on a poem, then it is forgotten, which is the beauty of writing poems—each poem is a new discovery.