South Dakota mathematician Daniel May enjoys finding connections between his discipline and other arts -- and herein we consider a constraint-structure for poetry that he has developed using a Fano plane. In brief, a Fano plane (shown in the diagram below) consists of 7 points and 7 lines (the three sides of the triangle, the three altitudes of the triangle, and the circle) -- with each line containing 3 of the points.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkN8tUEHM1zQ9lD1Pt-cECQtp62282WgJWWvIFFqGnQ1PNDbscAeDWZwvxVWvZ7khX7g0Q8qV5c3YTINkDzUNp0oJg2RQLUGpkN1Y_i5YbGu6b-mwo9dwZ9t2ojwAlktkjdJtNOWwdQI0/s200/FanoPlaneFromWeb.png) |
Fano Plane Diagram |
May creates a poem by associating a word with each point of the Fano plane and then creates a three-line stanza for each line of the diagram. Here is a template for the poem "adore" -- and the poem itself is offered below the diagram: