In mathematics, as in poetry, multiple meanings are common and create power for the language. For example, the number 0 is an idempotent element, an additive identity, a multiplicative annihilator -- and it also plays the role of something that may represent nothing.
In Dorothea Tanning's poem below -- I found it at poets.org -- zero takes on still another of its roles, that of place-holder -- as in the numbers 101 and 5000, for example.
Zero by Dorothea Tanning (1910-2012)
Now that legal tender has
lost its tenderness,
and its very legality
is so often in question.
it may be time to consider
the zero--
long rows of them.
empty, black circles in clumps
of three,
Showing posts with label Graywolf Press. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Graywolf Press. Show all posts
Saturday, January 3, 2015
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