Catchment – Poetry of Place will remain open for contributions between 21 March and 21 May, towards release of the journal’s 6th issue online on 21 June, 2026. Guidelines and our submission portal can both be accessed through the following link:
https://www.bawbawartsalliance.org.au/bcms/catchment/
As before, Australian poets working in Japanese-based forms can offer: either up to 5 tanka of a stand-alone nature; or a sequence of pieces, no larger than 4 tanka in total.
Contributors may submit up to 3 poems in free verse also/ instead, each as long as 30 lines, likewise showing a sense of location.
A biographical statement (no more than 50 words) should be submitted for each issue as well, please.
Discussions of Tanka on offer
In the meantime, 2026 will continue to bring you essays on poems of place, released each month under Catchment News & Views, accessible on the journal’s home page.
To coincide with the opening of our upcoming submission period, on 21 March I will be posting an evaluation of mine about portrayals of the marshland bird snipe in both haiku and tanka.
AHS members may likewise be interested in listening to a half-hour interview with me about tanka – broadcast recently on 3CR Community Radio (855 AM) – as presented by Di Cousens, a fellow member of the Fringe Myrtles Haiku Group in Melbourne:
https://www.3cr.org.au/spoken-word/episode/discovering-tanka
On 21 April, readers can also look forward to a new piece by our co-editor Jo McInerney, who will discuss interactive sequencing created by tanka poets working in collaboration.
Rodney Williams
Editor, Catchment – Poetry of Place
Baw Baw Arts Alliance, Gunaikurnai country, West Gippsland, Victoria
Australian Haiku Society 