From a Greek Nobelist . . .

     Poet Odysseus Elytis (1911-1996) won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1979.  At some time I purchased a copy of The Collected Poems of Odysseus Elytis (translated by Jeffrey Carson and Nicos Sarris, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998) and recently, during a reorganization of my bookshelves, have picked it up again.  His poetry is not easy for me to read but I have been drawn to explore the collection, Marie Nephele, which Carson's introduction tells us was more than fifteen years in the writing.  It is "arranged in three sections of twice seven poems with an introductory and closing poem and two intermediary songs ... ."  Half of the poems are in the voice of a youthful Maria and half in the voice of the poet, "the Antiphonist."  
     Throughout his verse, Elytis is not shy about using mathematical terminology.  Some samples: 

From "The Song of Maria Nepele":

       SUPERSTITION BROUGHT TO A MATHEMATICAL CLARITY WOULD HELP US PERCEIVE THE DEEPER STRUCTURE OF THE WORLD.

Light and laws, letters and numbers

     We viewers of the world see it through a variety of lenses -- for some of us music shapes our view, for others it is color, for others history; still others see through a lens of mathematics  -- perhaps geometry, or number, or randomization or . . .
     The Greek Nobelist (1979), poet, and essayist Odysseus Elytis (1911-1996) was once nicknamed "the sun-drinking poet" for views seen in The Axion Este / Worthy It Is.   A sample from this collection, "They Came," is offered below -- this poem is not only rich in the imagery of light but also pays tribute to geometry and numbers.