Sometimes our experiences with objects or ideas leads us to assign them personalities -- a notion illustrated in the poem "Zero," by Sue Owen, a poem that lives on my shelf in the anthology Verse and Universe: Poems about Science and Mathematics, edited by Kurt Brown (Milkweed Editions, 1998), and offered below.
Zero by Sue Owen
This is the story of zero,
born to live a life
of emptiness, only
child of plus and minus.
Its bones invisible
so it could be seen through
like an eye.
With that vision, you could
and how they mimic each other.
At first, it was thought
the zero was a mouth
and would say something
profound to the numbers.
But added to them, it never
amounted to much, and
subtracted, it never wanted
to take anything away.
Zero was a sad case,
only wanted to master emotion
and silence like chess.
Each winter, the approaching
degrees never could locate
its cold, missing heart.
"Zero" originally appeared in The Book of Winter (OSU Press, 1988) and appears here with the authors permission.
Food for thought: Which number are YOU? What is the personality of ZERO in your life?
No comments:
Post a Comment