Bernadette Turner teaches mathematics at Lincoln University in Missouri. And, via a long-ago email (lost for a while, and then found) she has offered this love poem enlivened by the terminology of geometry.
Parallel Lines Joined Forever by Bernadette Turner
We started out as just two parallel lines
in the plane of life.
I noticed your good points from afar,
but always kept same distance.
I assumed that you had not noticed me at all.
Showing posts with label point. Show all posts
Showing posts with label point. Show all posts
Monday, June 13, 2016
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Giving thanks for poems
As Thanksgiving approaches I am thankful not only for many blessings but also for the numbers I use to count them -- eight grandchildren, four children, two parents, one sister, one brother, an uncountable number of friends. And I am thankful for poetry. Here is one of my favorite math-related poems.
How to Find the Longest Distance Between Two Points
by James Kirkup (England, 1919 - 2009)
From eye to object no straight line is drawn,
Though love's quick pole directly kisses pole.
The luckless aeronaut feels earth and moon
Curve endlessly below, above the soul
His thought imagines, engineers in space.
How to Find the Longest Distance Between Two Points
by James Kirkup (England, 1919 - 2009)
From eye to object no straight line is drawn,
Though love's quick pole directly kisses pole.
The luckless aeronaut feels earth and moon
Curve endlessly below, above the soul
His thought imagines, engineers in space.
Sunday, October 26, 2014
Dimensions of Discovery
Along the one-dimensional straight line
there are points and segments
but no curves or squares.
there are points and segments
and squares and spheres.
there are points and segments
but no curves or squares.
In the flat plane of two dimensions
there are points and segments
and circles and squares.
In the vast space of three dimensions there are points and segments
and squares and spheres.
In a space of four dimensions
there is more than
we can imagine.
Monday, September 15, 2014
Remembering Lee Lorch
Lee Lorch was a mathematician known for his social activism on behalf of black Americans as well as for his mathematics. He died in February of this year in Toronto, at age 98. A life-long communist and a life-long crusader. Last Thursday I attended a memorial service (organized by Joe Auslander, a poetry-lover who one day had introduced me to the work of Frank Dux) for Lorch -- sponsored by the Mathematical Association for America and held at the MAA Carriage House in Washington, DC. Friends and colleagues of Lorch spoke of his positive energy and the ways that he had enriched the lives of students and colleagues, of friends and strangers. One of the speakers, Linda Braddy, a staff member of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA), did not talk about Lorch but about strategies for opening mathematical doors (as he had done) to new students.
Labels:
Against Infinity,
arc,
circles,
Joseph Auslander,
Lee Lorch,
Lillian Morrison,
Linda Braddy,
locus,
MAA,
point
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Averaging . . . geometry of the center
Perhaps partly due to his experience as an Air Force pilot during World War II, Harold Nemerov (1920 - 1991) uses geometry with deft precision as he describes phenomena around him. Here is a poem inspired by a 1986 news item.
Found Poem by Howard Nemerov
after information received in The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 4 v 86
The population center of the USA
Has shifted to Potosi, in Missouri.
The calculation employed by authorities
In arriving at this dislocation assumes
That the country is a geometric plane,
Perfectly flat, and that every citizen,
Found Poem by Howard Nemerov
after information received in The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 4 v 86
The population center of the USA
Has shifted to Potosi, in Missouri.
The calculation employed by authorities
In arriving at this dislocation assumes
That the country is a geometric plane,
Perfectly flat, and that every citizen,
Labels:
average,
balance,
calculation,
center,
flat,
geometry,
Howard Nemerov,
plane,
point,
population
Sunday, March 31, 2013
What are the odds -- of a kiss?
Virginia poet Bernadette Geyer has a new (2013) poetry book, The Scabbard of Her Throat -- and I have been exploring these engaging poems of family and fantasy. And finding among them this mathy poem, "Odds":
Odds by Bernadette Geyer
Eighty percent of all plane crashes occur in the first
three minutes or in the last minute of the flight.
The odds of winning the lottery are 1 in 18 million
but you can't win if you don't play. In Peru,
Odds by Bernadette Geyer
Eighty percent of all plane crashes occur in the first
three minutes or in the last minute of the flight.
The odds of winning the lottery are 1 in 18 million
but you can't win if you don't play. In Peru,
Labels:
Bernadette Geyer,
cross,
lottery,
odds,
percent,
poem,
point,
Word Works
Saturday, October 6, 2012
Geometry . . . a way of seeing
Today's poem is not only a fine work of art, it is also -- for me-- a doorway to memory. I first heard it in the poet's voice when he visited Bloomsburg University in the late 1980s, and I was alerted to the reading and to James Galvin's work by my most dear friend, BU Professor of English Ervene Gulley (1943-2008). Ervene had been a mathematics major as an undergraduate but moved on from abstract algebra to Shakespeare. Her compassion, her broad-seeing view, and her fierce logic served her well in the study and teaching of literature. And in friendship. I miss her daily. She, like Galvin, questioned life and probed its geometry.
Labels:
Elements,
Euclid,
geometry,
horizon,
James Galvin,
Johannes Kepler,
line,
mathematics,
opposite,
poetry,
point
Friday, July 15, 2011
I have dreamed geometry
Descartes by Jorge Luis Borges
I am the only man on earth, but perhaps there is neither earth nor man.
Perhaps a god is deceiving me.
Perhaps a god has sentenced me to time, that lasting illusion.
I dream the moon and I dream my eyes perceiving the moon.
I have dreamed the morning and evening of the first day.
I am the only man on earth, but perhaps there is neither earth nor man.
Perhaps a god is deceiving me.
Perhaps a god has sentenced me to time, that lasting illusion.
I dream the moon and I dream my eyes perceiving the moon.
I have dreamed the morning and evening of the first day.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Coleridge: A Mathematical Problem
"A Mathematical Problem" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) -- found online at Elite Skills Classics -- uses verse to describe construction of an equilateral triangle; Coleridge introduces the poem with a letter to his brother telling of his admiration of mathematics, a view rather rare among poets.
Labels:
angle,
centre,
circle,
construction,
equilateral triangle,
Euclid,
line,
mathematical,
mathematics,
poetry,
point,
problem,
proposition,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
Sarah Glaz
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Poems of set paradox and spatial dimension
Universal Paradox by Sandra DeLozier Coleman
One gigantic set made of all that there is
Boggles the mind with paradoxes.
For it is greater than all, but smaller than this —
The set which consists of the subsets of it.
One gigantic set made of all that there is
Boggles the mind with paradoxes.
For it is greater than all, but smaller than this —
The set which consists of the subsets of it.
Labels:
cube,
dimension,
endpoint,
hypercube,
paradox,
perpendicular,
point,
Sandra DeLozier Coleman,
set,
space,
subset,
universal set
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Thinking about Thinking
The question of what it means to think is never far from my focus -- and is particularly on my mind during these days that the computer Watson is competing on the TV game show, Jeopardy. Here is a poem I like a lot -- "New Math" by Cole Swensen -- in which the poet (writing more than 20 years ago) considers the limits of computation (and whether it could aid persons unable to recognize faces).
Labels:
circle,
Cole Swensen,
computation,
compute,
computer,
equation,
Jeopardy,
math,
numerical,
point,
prosopagnosia,
Watson,
zero
Friday, December 31, 2010
The year ends -- and we go on . . .
Immortal Helix by Archibald MacLeish (1892-1982)
HEREUNDER Jacob Schmidt who, man and bones,
Has been his hundred times around the sun.
HEREUNDER Jacob Schmidt who, man and bones,
Has been his hundred times around the sun.
Labels:
Archibald MacLeish,
helix,
inscribed,
mathematics,
poetry,
point,
sphere,
surface
Saturday, November 20, 2010
More from Guillevic
My October 13 post presented three small poems by the French poet Guillevic (1909-97). Strongly drawn to his work, I have purchased the collection Geometries (translated by Richard Sieburth, Ugly Duckling Presse, 2010); Guillevic has found in each geometric figure a personality and a voice. Buy the book and enjoy!
Here are three additional samples from Geometries:
Here are three additional samples from Geometries:
Monday, September 27, 2010
Ideal Geometry -- complex politics
Christopher Morley (1890-1957) was an American poet, novelist, and publisher who was the son of a poet and musician (Lilian Janet Bird) and a mathematics professor (Frank Morley) at Haverford College. His "Sonnet by a Geometer," below, is written in the voice of a circle and compares mathematical perfection with human imperfection. For us who read the poem 90 years after its writing, Morley's phrase in line 13 -- "They talk of 14 points" -- is puzzling at first.
Labels:
14 points,
3 points,
Christopher Morley,
circle,
Euclid,
geometer,
geometry,
mathematics,
perpendicular,
pi,
poetry,
point,
sonnet,
tangent,
World War I
Monday, August 30, 2010
What is the point? -- consider Euclid
A two-line poem by Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda (1904-73), found in my bilingual edition of Extravagaria, reminded me of the poetic nature of several of the opening expressions of Euclid's geometry. Both of these follow:
Monday, May 10, 2010
Margaret Cavendish (1623-73) -- The Circle of the Brain cannot be Squared
Margaret Cavendish (1623-73) was a writer who published under her own name at a time when most women published anonymously. Her writing addressed a number of topics, including gender equity and scientific method.
Labels:
arithmetic,
atom,
circle,
cube,
Euclid,
figure,
Margaret Cavendish,
mathematics,
number,
passion,
poetry,
point,
quantity,
quotient,
squaring the circle,
subtract,
triangle
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