Thursday, January 31, 2019

What can be proven . . .

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     Two weeks ago poet Mary Oliver  (1935-2019) died and her passing has caused me to turn again to her work. In "I Looked Up" --...
Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Mathy Limericks

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     Many mathy poets enjoy the challenge of satisfying (or almost-satisfying) the prescribed rhythm and rhyme schemes for the five-line po...
Monday, January 28, 2019

2019 AMS Prize-Winning Math Poems

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     Last fall the American Mathematical Society held a math-poetry contest for Maryland students and the winners were announced and celebr...
1 comment:
Thursday, January 24, 2019

A Multi-Author Poem Celebrating Math-People

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     At the  Joint Mathematics Meetings in Baltimore  last Friday evening, the Journal of Humanistic Mathematics ( JHM ) and  SIGMAA-ARTS ...
1 comment:
Tuesday, January 22, 2019

"Math and Self" -- a visual poem

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     One of the great pleasures of attending mathematics meetings in Baltimore last week was meeting old friends.  One of these, Gabriel Pra...
Monday, January 21, 2019

A poetry equation . . . .

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     My recent attendance (January 16-19) at the Joint Mathematics Meetings in Baltimore has resulted in a pile of math-poetry items to sor...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019

A Perfect Number

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     One of the things I love to find in a poem is the surprise of a double meaning -- especially involving a mathematical term such as ...
2 comments:
Monday, January 14, 2019

Poems that Celebrate Mathematicians

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     Recently I received from John Golden ( blogger at mathhombre.blogspot.com and math professor at Michigan's Grand Valley State Uni...
Wednesday, January 9, 2019

Mathematical motherhood -- keeping count

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     The Journal of Humanistic Mathematics , with new issues coming twice a year, late in January and July, is a wonderful resource.  Their ...
Friday, January 4, 2019

A poem . . . like a mathematical proof . . .

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     Mathematician-Poet Sarah Glaz has been active in bringing poetry events to the annual summer Math-Arts conference Bridges  -- and she ...
3 comments:
Wednesday, January 2, 2019

Celebrate a Science Woman -- and offer friendship!

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      Last weekend's Washington Post used the headline    Astronomer celebrated as the 'mother' of the Hubble Space Telescope ...
Monday, December 31, 2018

Celebrating winter with a Fibonacci poem

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  Another year ends . . . may 2019 bring good numbers for us all!        Exercise -- especially jogging -- helps to channel my restless...
Thursday, December 27, 2018

The square root of tomorrow . . .

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     The surprise of a mathy poem came into my email-box at 6 AM this morning, delivered as " Poem-of-the-Day " from the wonderful...
Thursday, December 20, 2018

A Syllable-Snowball of Holiday Wishesl

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  o    This   Christmas   let us strive    to    multiply    our understanding   of different neighbors --   each day add de...
Monday, December 17, 2018

Examining boundaries for Math-Women

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Mathematician Ursula Whitcher is a versatile and interesting person -- and currently an editor for the American Mathematical Society's M...
Wednesday, December 12, 2018

Defending Poetry . . . .

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With sadness I learned yesterday of the death of poet Meena Alexander (1951-2018) -- not only a fine poet but also one of my treasured teac...
Monday, December 10, 2018

The Heart's Arithmetic

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     For me, the Christmas holiday season is a time for family gathering and a treasured time for that reason.  Today my thoughts turn to on...
Friday, December 7, 2018

United by ice cream -- the sphere and cone

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     During recent months I have been part of an online course that has helped me and a dozen others to learn steps for editing Wikipedia -...
Tuesday, December 4, 2018

By Claude Shannon -- a Poem for Rubik's Cube

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     Below I present the opening lines of an 80-line (plus footnotes) poetic creation by Claude Shannon (1916-2001).  A mathematician, engi...
Friday, November 30, 2018

Chaos theory -- portrayed in poetry

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     A poem I have long loved is "Chaos Theory" by poet (and fiction writer and scholar) Ronald Wallace -- and he has given me pe...
Wednesday, November 28, 2018

Counting words with the Fibonacci numbers . . .

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Today a poem by New York poet, Larissa Shmailo , that explores aging with word-counts that match  the Fibonacci numbers.   ...
Monday, November 26, 2018

Marriage in Quantum Mechanics

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     Sometimes mathematical concepts also bring to mind phenomena in our everyday lives -- as in this poem by New Jersey poet  Charlotte Man...
Wednesday, November 21, 2018

Thankful for . ..

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          Now           I           give thanks --           for your grace           and empathy, for           mathematics and poetr...
Monday, November 19, 2018

Qualitative thinking in a quantitative era . . .

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Chemistry Nobelist  Roald Hoffman also is a poet,  and an advocate of holistic education. Many thanks to Australian poet and STEAM adv...
Friday, November 16, 2018

A poet that makes math personal

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     Mathematician-poet Marion Cohen has a new poetry collection just out -- The Project of Being Alive .  Here is a sample from that colle...
Wednesday, November 14, 2018

A FIRST-LOVE in math-poetry -- "Counting Rhymes"

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     Still in my head are counting rhymes that I learned in childhood -- an early connection between mathematics and poetry that I think hel...
Monday, November 12, 2018

Mathy poems at poets.org

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 For a variety of mathy poems, here's a GREAT link to follow . 
Wednesday, November 7, 2018

Rhyming wordplay -- with math terms . . .

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     Nineteenth century British poet Arthur Clement Hilton (1851-1877) died young but during his short life he wrote some lively verse.  He...
Monday, November 5, 2018

Applied Science -- and Art

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     Some days there is time to sort through piles of old stuff saved on a shelf -- and this morning's fun-find was a September 1993 iss...
Friday, November 2, 2018

The Puzzle of Time

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     Recently I have learned with sadness of the death last February  of Romanian-Canadian mathematician Florin Diacu (1959-2018).  Florin ...
Tuesday, October 30, 2018

Five Little Pumpkins

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  Happy Halloween! This children's rhyme is found at the DeepLearningToolKits(DLTK) website ) and available at that site also with...
Friday, October 26, 2018

The Prince of Algebra . . . and SAT scores

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     An article in a recent issue of the  Washington Post (perhaps this link will get you to it) told of a drop in SAT scores for the Class...
Thursday, October 25, 2018

Enter by Nov 9 -- Student Math-Poetry Contest

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C ontest sponsored by the A merican M athematical S ociety  for   junior-high students . . .  . senior-high students . . . college stu...
Monday, October 22, 2018

Describing a scene with numbers

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      Lana Hechtman Ayers is a versatile and accomplished poet who also has a degree in mathematics --  in her poem below, she paints a pic...
Thursday, October 18, 2018

Read your Math-Poetry in Baltimore, 1/18/19

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You are invited be part of a reading of math-linked poetry   sponsored by the  Journal of Humanistic Mathematics    and   SIGMAA-ARTS ...
Wednesday, October 17, 2018

Math-themed -- and seasonal -- Haiku

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      Artist and computer scientist Stephen Luecking , now retired from teaching at DePaul University, has sent me some of his Haiku with ma...
Monday, October 15, 2018

Can numbers be a bridge to understanding. . . ?

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Fifty-Fifty      by Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)        W hat is there for us two        to split fifty-fifty,        to go halvers on? ...
Friday, October 12, 2018

The music of twelve tones -- in poems

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     Inspired by the musical composition strategy  twelve-tone technique  -- devised by Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg (1974-1951), in...
Wednesday, October 10, 2018

Math-Poetry Contest for Maryland Students

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Submission deadline :  November 9, 2018 Winners Announced :  December 12, 2018 Winning Poems Presented :  January 19, 2019      The Amer...
Monday, October 8, 2018

A special Fibonacci poem

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     A recent email from Marian Christie -- a nominally retired mathematics teacher from Aberdeenshire  -- alerted me to her very special s...
Friday, October 5, 2018

Line and design -- poetry by Adrienne Rich

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     A poem I first read during my high school years -- and have loved ever since -- is " Aunt Jennifer's Tigers " by Adrienne...
Wednesday, October 3, 2018

The equal sign--and poetry--from Robert Recorde

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  A poetic introduction of the equal sign (by Robert Recorde):  This image is an excerpt from Recorde's The Whetstone of Witte (1...
Sunday, September 30, 2018

Counting syllables . . . measuring memory

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Political events of this past week (involving a candidate nominated by President 45 to serve on the Supreme Court) have triggered my thinkin...
Wednesday, September 26, 2018

Name five!

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     A recent mailing from the National Museum of Women in the Arts offered me this challenge:  name five female artists!  Including friends...