Tanka poems composed by Dokuho Okada, a Buddhist monk in Mihara, Hiroshima Prefecture, had a grain of light-hearted humor in them, even in one about the new coronavirus. Okada died in 2020 at the ...

The apparent gibberish “Mijikabino/ Kyapuriki toreba/ Sugichobire/ Sugikakisurano/ Happa fumifumi,” loosely in the 31-syllable tanka format, was aired in a TV commercial. I was refreshingly ...