Wednesday, February 24, 2021

Filling my coffee cup . . .

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      When I am asked to give a poetry workshop that includes people who have not written poetry, I find that asking them to concentrate on ...
Monday, February 22, 2021

In the Space of Certain Dimensions

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Browsing at Poets.org I found this fascinating poem by Anne Tardos and she has give me permission to post it here.      NINE, 40       by ...
Thursday, February 18, 2021

Mathematician, astronomer, poet -- and female

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 An amazing woman -- Wang Zhenyi !      In this article in April Magazine , we can learn of her achievements:     Born in 1768 in a family ...
Monday, February 15, 2021

Measure the Skies

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     Born around 1753, Phillis Wheatley was the first enslaved black poet in America to publish a book.  Here is a stanza from her poem, &q...
Friday, February 12, 2021

Valentine Haiku

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     Since 2011 February has been National Haiku Writing Month ( NaHaiWriMo) ; serious celebration of this event requires writing a Haiku ea...
Thursday, February 11, 2021

A Math-Poetry Essay -- in the Time of Corona

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     Springer Publishing is developing an e-book, Mathematics in the Time of Corona , an online collection of various reactions to the pande...
Monday, February 8, 2021

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics -- new issue

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      Recently released, Issue 1 of Volume 11 (2021) of the Journal of Humanistic Mathematics ;  in it Editors Mark Huber and Gizem Karaali ...
Thursday, February 4, 2021

Poetry from a Math Professor in China

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  Does our language shape our thoughts? Professor Ya Shi – a pen name meaning “mute stone” – teaches university-level mathematics in his ho...
Tuesday, February 2, 2021

Celebrate Black History with Poetry

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     In February now, Black History Month, I look back to one of my favorite poets, Langston Hughes (1902-1967) and bring to you, again, one...
Monday, February 1, 2021

What will the groundhog predict?

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     Having grown up in western Pennsylvania, not far from Punxsutawney, I have long been interested in Groundhog Day -- on February 2, a l...
1 comment:
Wednesday, January 27, 2021

Holocaust Remembrance Day

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Today, January 27, is Holocaust Remembrance Day .  Looking for mathy poems to connect to this theme I found this posting at jstheater.blogsp...
Monday, January 25, 2021

The Fruits of Undefinitions

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     The poem "Undefined Terms" by poet-mathematician Katharine O'Brien (1901-1986) is a favorite of mine from long ago that ...
Wednesday, January 20, 2021

Inauguration Day Poem

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 Read by Youth Poet Laureate, Amanda Gorman , an inspiring Biden-inauguration poem, " The Hill We Climb ." " . . . we lift o...
Monday, January 18, 2021

Remembering Martin Luther King, Jr

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       Today as a nation we remember and pay tribute to Rev.  Martin Luther King, Jr . (1929-1968) -- Baptist minster, Civil Rights leader -...
Thursday, January 14, 2021

Bridges Math-Arts Conference 2021

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Learn more here:  http://bridgesmathart.org/   Since 2009, interested contributors from mathematics and various arts -- poetry, music, thea...
Monday, January 11, 2021

Number Personalities . . .

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      Sometimes our experiences with objects or ideas leads us to assign them personalities -- a notion illustrated in the poem "Zero,&...
Thursday, January 7, 2021

Poetic Mathy Quotes

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      In India, National Mathematics Day is celebrated each year on December 22 -- the birthday of mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887-...
Monday, January 4, 2021

Numbers and Faces, a math-poetry anthology

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 Celebrating the NEW year with a collection of OLD favorites!       Twenty years ago in 2001, supported by a grant from EXXONMOBIL, the Huma...
1 comment:
Wednesday, December 30, 2020

The Doomsday Rule

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     My recently posted mention of Tristian Bangert's poem about John Horton Conway (1937-2020) sent me looking through my files for m...
Monday, December 28, 2020

Geometry Personalities

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  When a triangle talks to a square, what does she say? Among my favorites of mathy poems are poems by Guillevic (1907-1997) -- in which ...
Wednesday, December 23, 2020

Counting Syllables for Christmas

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     As I look ahead toward Christmas, I shape my thoughts into words with syllable-counts that match the Fibonacci numbers. Holiday musing ...
Monday, December 21, 2020

Admiring John Conway with stories of numbers

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     Recently I was contacted by Thomas Barr, Director of Programs at the American Mathematical Society who told me of poetry written by a ...
Wednesday, December 16, 2020

Proofs in Poems -- the Sylow Theorems

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     One of my valuable resources during this year 2020 has been the AMS PAGE A DAY CALENDAR by Evelyn Lamb -- published by the American Mat...
1 comment:
Monday, December 14, 2020

Solving problems -- crimes and mathematics

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     In childhood I loved novels that featured the girl-detective, Nancy Drew, and in adulthood I have continued to enjoy crime-solving fict...
Thursday, December 10, 2020

How should a professor groom for math class?

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     One of the rewards of many new endeavors is making new friends -- and one of the special connections I have made through math-poetry en...
Monday, December 7, 2020

Gatherings of a retired teacher . . .

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David Pleacher is a retired mathematics teacher who has maintained a math page on the Internet since 1998 -- and one of his rich and varied...
Wednesday, December 2, 2020

Celebrate Math Women . . . Write about them!!

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     This message is a follow-up to a posting made on October 12 -- an announcement of the Student Essay Contest sponsored by the Associat...
Friday, November 27, 2020

November is Native American Heritage Month

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      Today, the day after Thanksgiving, is Native American Heritage Day -- a November event that was proclaimed in 2009 by President Obama...
Wednesday, November 25, 2020

Gather in Poems

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 Gather in Poems -- a sort of Thanksgiving      Last evening I attended a lovely virtual reading, "Gather in Poems," sponsored by ...
1 comment:
Monday, November 23, 2020

Happy Fibonacci Day!

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        Today, November 23 is Fibonacci Day . . . How are you celebrating?  Twitter poet Brian Bilston (@Brian_Bilston) has posted a Fibo...
Wednesday, November 18, 2020

Shaping POETRY with GEOMETRY

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Syllable-count constraints help me to think carefully about word choices as I construct a poem.  Here are square and triangular stanzas that...
Monday, November 16, 2020

Poetry and Mathematics -- opening doors . . .

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Since 1998 The Bridges Organization has been offering conferences that publicize and celebrate links connecting mathematics and the arts.  ...
Wednesday, November 11, 2020

Venn Diagrams

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      During these days of classifying people and points of view, my thoughts turn again and again to Venn Diagrams and I am then reminded ...
Monday, November 9, 2020

Special Days for Mathematics

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Today is the birthday of black mathematician, astronomer, almanac-writer and puzzle-maker Benjamin Banneker (1731-1806) -- and some of his ...
Thursday, November 5, 2020

Varieties of SQUARE poems

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      When writing a poem on a topic about which I feel strongly, I often like to use constraints -- such as patterns of syllable-counts or ...
1 comment:
Monday, November 2, 2020

Voting is on the calendar!

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Poetry often surprises us by using familiar words in new ways -- and such is also the case with this cryptarithmetic puzzle -- offered by Ev...
Thursday, October 29, 2020

Seeking wisdom in mathematical Haiku

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 During these difficult pre-election coronavirus days I have been turning to poetry, and especially favoring -- for their brevity -- Haiku. ...
Monday, October 26, 2020

Math Songs by Tom Lehrer -- Political, etc.

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      All of the songs of musician and math-teacher and nonagenarian Tom Lehrer are now in the public domain ( at this link ).  His mathy i...
Wednesday, October 21, 2020

Spirit of Delight . . .

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        The true spirit of delight, the exaltation,         the sense of being more than man,         which is the touchstone of the highest...
Monday, October 19, 2020

2020 Nobel Laureates -- Mathematics and Poetry

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     Both mathematics and poetry are languages for conveying complex ideas . . . for example, Oxford mathematical physicist Roger Penrose u...
Tuesday, October 13, 2020

Celebrating Ada Lovelace

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     Today, 13 October 2020, is  Ada Lovelace Day -- celebrated each year on the second Tuesday of October and an international celebration ...
Monday, October 12, 2020

Brilliant Math-Women -- Share the News!

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     Recently (10/10/2020), NPR had an interview with former teachers of Louisville shooting victim Breonna Taylor   -- an interview that ce...