Sunflower Tanka will open for submissions in late summer of 2026. A post from this site will notify readers of the theme and submission periods. Please follow this blog to receive notifications.

Poems received outside the submission period will not be considered. Thank you.

PLEASE NOTE: Using AI to write your poetry goes against our publishing standards. We cannot accept AI generated poetry. Do not rewrite your poetry using AI such as ChatGPT or other AI types of AI. If you send us AI generated poetry, it will be rejected.

Amazon allows us to use Grammarly, Pro Writing Aid, Canva, LanguageTool, etc., for spelling and minor editing. Please let us know what program you used. We must declare these writing aids to Amazon at the time of publication.

Please submit 3 poems. We’re looking for tanka (5/7/5/7/7), tanka prose, and experimental tanka—s/l/s/l/l, tanka series Rensaku, taiga (tanka on a black and white photo) bussokusekika (5/7/5/7/7/7), and experimental tanka (garland tanka, tanka Puente, etc.) written in the English language on the current theme in an email. We’d like to publish tanka and tanka prose, from the traditional to the experimental. All poems must be your own original work. Please submit only once per submission period.

Please do not submit previously published tanka/tanka prose. Every journal has different definitions of what “published,” means. This is our definition:

If a poem has been published in another journal or on a blog, we consider the poem as published, so please don’t send it to Sunflower Tanka. In addition, if a poem appeared in a self-published poetry book, don’t send it to Sunflower Tanka. If you have any questions, please contact us at tankatuesdaypoetry@gmail.com.

As co-editor’s, we establish the guidelines for submissions, and we hope to be the first to showcase your talented tanka and tanka prose with the rest of the world in this year’s Sunflower Tanka Journal.

Please write your tanka and/or tanka prose using the theme that will be announced in late summer 2026. If you don’t use the words of the theme, we must be able to infer the meaning.

  • The first letter of each line of Japanese syllabic poetry is not capitalized.
  • Tanka do not have titles. Please add titles to your tanka prose, tanka rensaku (series), taiga, tanka Puente & garland tanka.

🌻 Sunflower Tanka only receives submissions by email. Thank you.🌻

To: tankatuesdaypoetry@gmail.com

Subject Line: SUBMISSIONS – CURRENT THEME – YOUR NAME

The body of your email should look like this:

First Name: name

Second Name: last name

Email Address: your email

Social Media Address: your blog address

Copyright Name: your name as the author

Spelling & Punctuation Programs you used: We do NOT accept AI written poetry. (Amazon allows us to use Grammarly, Pro Writing Aid, Canva, LanguageTool, etc., for spelling and punctuation. We must declare these writing aids to Amazon at the time of publication).

One sentence introduction: EX: (Your name is a poet/author who loves finding the magic in everyday connections through prose & poetry).

Country: country where you live

List the program you used for editing: Amazon allows us to use Grammarly, Pro Writing Aid, Canva, LanguageTool, etc., for spelling and punctuation editing. We must declare these writing aids to Amazon at the time of publication.

Add your 3 poems in the body of the email. Please keep the poems left aligned to the page, with two lines between each poem. Do NOT attach a Word document. If you submit a Rensaku series, please number each poem in the order the stanzas should appear. Thanks.

Poets will retain the copyright of their poems after publication. If you use your poem elsewhere, please add the line: “This poem was first published in the 2025 Edition of Sunflower Tanka.”

PLEASE NOTE: Poets will be able to purchase an EPUB (Kindle) or PDF (print) copy of the anthology through Amazon.com. If poets live in a country that prohibits the purchase of the anthology through Amazon.com or their country’s Amazon affiliate, you might want to reconsider submitting to this anthology. We do not send copies of the anthology though email or by U.S. mail. Thank you.

This year, we’re looking for five poets who have accepted submissions in this journal to volunteer their blog to showcase the anthology for marketing purposes. In addition, these posts will be teaching posts, instructing readers on how to create the forms featured in the Sunflower Tanka Anthology.

Thank you. We look forward to reading your syllabic poetry.

Robbie Cheadle & Colleen Chesebro