These recent days in the reign of the 45th US President have given new drama to the word survival. Looking for wisdom I revisited this poem, a survival-poem with a couple of numbers -- by Maggie Smith -- found at one of my favorite sources for poetry, PoetryFoundation.org.
Good Bones by Maggie Smith
Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I’ll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Sunday, January 29, 2017
Girls can do EVERYTHING!
In a conversation years ago with one of my math colleagues at Bloomsburg University, each of us learned that the other had grown up on a farm. My colleague credited the problem-solving requirements of farm-life with being good training for mathematics. In time, I came to agree with him. Some environments EXPECT you to be a problem-solver and, in spite of yourself, you comply. I have tried to write poetically about this. My efforts so far include these 3x3 syllable-square poems.
And, here is a link to a recent NPR story about the underestimates that girls make about how smart they are -- so little has changed since I was a girl. Hoping I can help to change things for my granddaughters!
Girls who change
light-bulbs change
everything!
Girls who prove
theorems can
do it all!
And, here is a link to a recent NPR story about the underestimates that girls make about how smart they are -- so little has changed since I was a girl. Hoping I can help to change things for my granddaughters!
Thursday, January 26, 2017
Ultimately, all mathematics is poetry . . .
A popular vote on the truth of "all mathematics is poetry" might not lead to its affirmation. Because mathematics is a concise language, with emphasis on placing the best words in the best order, it often is described by mathematicians and scientists as poetry. Alternatively, and more accessible to most readers than poetic mathematics, we find verses by poets who include the objects and terminology of mathematics in their lines.
Perhaps due to aesthetic distance (featured in The Art of Mathematics by Jerry King), non-math poets like Christina M. Rau are able to be more playful in their uses of mathematical vocabulary than mathematicians dare to be. Enjoy below several stanzas from Rau's collection, Liberating the Astronauts -- which also includes titles like "Chasing Zero" and "Kepler's Laws" -- soon to be released by Aqueduct Press.
from: Overnight Rain by Christina M. Rau
Rain over Night
Equals
X over Autumn
Perhaps due to aesthetic distance (featured in The Art of Mathematics by Jerry King), non-math poets like Christina M. Rau are able to be more playful in their uses of mathematical vocabulary than mathematicians dare to be. Enjoy below several stanzas from Rau's collection, Liberating the Astronauts -- which also includes titles like "Chasing Zero" and "Kepler's Laws" -- soon to be released by Aqueduct Press.
from: Overnight Rain by Christina M. Rau
Rain over Night
Equals
X over Autumn
Monday, January 23, 2017
All Mathematicians are Equal!
Last Saturday's Women's March in Washington was one the great events of my lifetime -- the feeling of community that bonded us participants was palpable. We chatted and hugged and celebrated our differences and our common ideals. Here is a photo of the sign that I carried and, beneath the sign, are links to poems about women in mathematics who struggled to be considered equal.
This link leads to "Hanging Fire" by Audre Lorde. This link leads to a few words of mine, "Square Attitudes." A posting on girls and mathematics includes samples from Sharon Olds and Kyoko Mori and is available here.
![]() |
This is the sign I carried at the Women's March on January 21, 2017. |
This link leads to "Hanging Fire" by Audre Lorde. This link leads to a few words of mine, "Square Attitudes." A posting on girls and mathematics includes samples from Sharon Olds and Kyoko Mori and is available here.
Labels:
Audre Lorde,
equal,
Kyoko Mori,
Sharon Olds,
Women's March
Thursday, January 19, 2017
Dickens, from A Tale of Two Cities
Today I am facing tomorrow and the inauguration ceremony of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States. With many uncertainties and little mathematics in mind (see, however, math-poem link below), I have looked back to the opening words of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (1812-1870). Published in 1859, these words echo some of my thoughts today.
It was the best of times,
it was the worst of times,
it was the age of wisdom,
it was the age of foolishness,
it was the epoch of belief,
it was the epoch of incredulity,
it was the season of Light,
it was the season of Darkness,
it was the spring of hope,
it was the winter of despair,
we had everything before us,
we had nothing before us . . .
Here is a link to a poem posted in 2014 that also features the words of Dickens. Written by Halifax mathematician and poet Robert Dawson, that 2014 poem was formed by applying a mathematical procedure to a passage from Dickens' Great Expectations.
It was the best of times,
it was the worst of times,
it was the age of wisdom,
it was the age of foolishness,
it was the epoch of belief,
it was the epoch of incredulity,
it was the season of Light,
it was the season of Darkness,
it was the spring of hope,
it was the winter of despair,
we had everything before us,
we had nothing before us . . .
Here is a link to a poem posted in 2014 that also features the words of Dickens. Written by Halifax mathematician and poet Robert Dawson, that 2014 poem was formed by applying a mathematical procedure to a passage from Dickens' Great Expectations.
Labels:
Charles Dickens,
Donald Trump,
Robert Dawson
Monday, January 16, 2017
Celebrate Martin Luther King
Today is our public celebration of the January 15 birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr (1929-1968) who was both preacher and poet in the "I have a dream" speech he delivered on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. on August 28, 1963.
Dr King's speech began with:
Five score years ago, a great American,
in whose symbolic shadow we stand
signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
This momentous decree came as a
great beacon light of hope
to millions of Negro slaves who had been
seared in the flames of withering injustice.
Dr King's speech began with:
Five score years ago, a great American,
in whose symbolic shadow we stand
signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
This momentous decree came as a
great beacon light of hope
to millions of Negro slaves who had been
seared in the flames of withering injustice.
Wednesday, January 11, 2017
Poems starring mathematicians
One of the challenges posed by a multi-year blog is locating interesting old posts. One of my frequent early topics was "poems starring mathematicians" and I offer links to several of these from 2011 below:
December 8 "Monsieur Probability" by Brian McCabe
November 13 My abecedarian poems, "I Know a Mathematician" and "Mathematician"
July 5 "Fixed Points" by Susan Case -- about mathematicians in Poland during WWII
July 2 "To Myself" by Abba Kovner
January 30 "Mr Glusenkamp," a sonnet to a geometry teacher by Ronald Wallace
January 28 "Mathematician" by Sherman K Stein
And, here is a link, via PoemHunter.com to "The Mathematician in Love," a poem by William John Macquorn Rankine, a poem that appears also in the multi-variable anthology, Strange Attractors: Poems of Love and Mathematics (AK Peters, 2008), edited by Sarah Glaz and me. Here is the first (of 8) stanza of Rankine's entertaining poem:
A mathematician fell madly in love
With a lady, young, handsome, and charming:
By angles and ratios harmonic he strove
Her curves and proportions all faultless to prove.
As he scrawled hieroglyphics alarming.
December 8 "Monsieur Probability" by Brian McCabe
November 13 My abecedarian poems, "I Know a Mathematician" and "Mathematician"
July 5 "Fixed Points" by Susan Case -- about mathematicians in Poland during WWII
July 2 "To Myself" by Abba Kovner
January 30 "Mr Glusenkamp," a sonnet to a geometry teacher by Ronald Wallace
January 28 "Mathematician" by Sherman K Stein
And, here is a link, via PoemHunter.com to "The Mathematician in Love," a poem by William John Macquorn Rankine, a poem that appears also in the multi-variable anthology, Strange Attractors: Poems of Love and Mathematics (AK Peters, 2008), edited by Sarah Glaz and me. Here is the first (of 8) stanza of Rankine's entertaining poem:
A mathematician fell madly in love
With a lady, young, handsome, and charming:
By angles and ratios harmonic he strove
Her curves and proportions all faultless to prove.
As he scrawled hieroglyphics alarming.
Friday, January 6, 2017
2017 is prime!
For her December 31 posting in Roots of Unity (Scientific American blog) mathematician Evelyn Lamb wrote about favorite primes -- and starring in her list is our new year-number, 2017.
My own relationship with primes also is admiring-- here is an excerpt from my poem, "Fool's Gold," (found in full here) that suggests a prime as a suitable birthday gift:
Select and give a number. I like large primes—
they check my tendency to subdivide
myself among the dreams that tease
like iron pyrites in declining light.
"Fool's Gold" appears in my chapbook, My Dance is Mathematics (Paper Kite Press, 2006); the collection is now out-of-print but is available online here.
Several poems about primes have been included in earlier postings in this blog. For example, here is a link to a 2013 posting of "The Sieve of Erastosthenes" by Robin Chapman. And, for further exploration, here is a link to the results of searching the six years of postings using the term "prime."
My own relationship with primes also is admiring-- here is an excerpt from my poem, "Fool's Gold," (found in full here) that suggests a prime as a suitable birthday gift:
Select and give a number. I like large primes—
they check my tendency to subdivide
myself among the dreams that tease
like iron pyrites in declining light.
"Fool's Gold" appears in my chapbook, My Dance is Mathematics (Paper Kite Press, 2006); the collection is now out-of-print but is available online here.
Several poems about primes have been included in earlier postings in this blog. For example, here is a link to a 2013 posting of "The Sieve of Erastosthenes" by Robin Chapman. And, for further exploration, here is a link to the results of searching the six years of postings using the term "prime."
Tuesday, January 3, 2017
December 2016 (and prior) -- titles, dates of posts
Here are the titles and dates of previous blog postings,
moving backward from the present.
For mathy poems related to a particular mathy topic -- such as women in math or climate or triangle or circle or teacher or . . . -- click on a selected title below or enter the desired term in the SEARCH box in the right-hand column. For example, here is a link to a selection of poems found using the pair of search terms "women equal." For poems about calculus, follow this link. To find a list of useful search terms, scroll down the right-hand column.
Dec 31 Happy New Year! -- Resolve to REWARD WOMEN!
Dec 27 Celebrate Vera Rubin -- a WOMAN of science!
Dec 26 Post-Christmas reflections from W. H. Auden
Dec 19 Numbers for Christmas . . .
Dec 15 Remembering Thomas Schelling (1921-2016)
Dec 12 When one isn't enough ... words from a Cuban poet
Dec 31 Happy New Year! -- Resolve to REWARD WOMEN!
Dec 27 Celebrate Vera Rubin -- a WOMAN of science!
Dec 26 Post-Christmas reflections from W. H. Auden
Dec 19 Numbers for Christmas . . .
Dec 15 Remembering Thomas Schelling (1921-2016)
Dec 12 When one isn't enough ... words from a Cuban poet
Saturday, December 31, 2016
Happy New Year! -- Resolve to REWARD WOMEN!
My December 27 post celebrated the life of Vera Rubin (b 1928) who died on Christmas Day -- and a more recent Washington Post article by columnist Petula Dvorak has used the example of Vera Rubin to call further attention to ongoing discrimination against high-achieving women.
On a different note, my e-mail "poem-a-day" from poets.org is "Earthy Anecdotes" by Reading, Pennsylvania poet Wallace Stevens (1879-1955)-- follow this link to visit the poem (with its morsel of mathematics) and see the vivid image of Oklahoma bucks moving in "a swift, circular line".
On a different note, my e-mail "poem-a-day" from poets.org is "Earthy Anecdotes" by Reading, Pennsylvania poet Wallace Stevens (1879-1955)-- follow this link to visit the poem (with its morsel of mathematics) and see the vivid image of Oklahoma bucks moving in "a swift, circular line".
Happy New Year, 2017!
Labels:
Petula Dvorak,
Vera Rubin,
Wallace Stevens
Tuesday, December 27, 2016
Celebrate Vera Rubin -- a WOMAN of science!
This morning's Washington Post carried an obituary of Vera Rubin (1928-2016), a pioneering astronomer who confirmed the existence of dark matter. Yesterday's NPR feature -- noting Rubin's death and celebrating her life -- contained several quotes from this outstanding scientist about women's roles. Two of these poetic statements I have shaped into syllable-square stanzas:
World wide, half
of all brains
are women's.
Monday, December 26, 2016
Post-Christmas reflections from W. H. Auden
A favorite writer whose works I enjoy again and again is English poet Wystan Hugh Auden (1907-1973). Here is a mathy excerpt from a very long Auden poem (around 1500 lines) entitled "FOR THE TIME BEING: A Christmas Oratorio," written during World War II and available in his Collected Poems.
The Christmas Feast is already a fading memory,
And already the mind begins to be vaguely aware
Of an unpleasant whiff of apprehension at the thought
Of Lent and Good Friday which cannot, after all, now
Be very far off. But, for the time being, here we all are,
Back in the moderate Aristotelian city
Of darning and the Eight-Fifteen, where Euclid's geometry
And Newton's mechanics would account for our experience,
And the kitchen table exists because I scrub it.
Another mathy Auden poem, "Numbers and Faces," is available here. And this link leads to more of his work.
The Christmas Feast is already a fading memory,
And already the mind begins to be vaguely aware
Of an unpleasant whiff of apprehension at the thought
Of Lent and Good Friday which cannot, after all, now
Be very far off. But, for the time being, here we all are,
Back in the moderate Aristotelian city
Of darning and the Eight-Fifteen, where Euclid's geometry
And Newton's mechanics would account for our experience,
And the kitchen table exists because I scrub it.
Another mathy Auden poem, "Numbers and Faces," is available here. And this link leads to more of his work.
Monday, December 19, 2016
Numbers for Christmas . . .
*
o n
t o p
g i v e
l i g h t
f r e e l y
f o r e v e r
a b u n d a n t
b r i l l i a n t
e v e r y w h e r e
o n
t o p
g i v e
l i g h t
f r e e l y
f o r e v e r
a b u n d a n t
b r i l l i a n t
e v e r y w h e r e
LOVE MATH!
Christmas is coming and I have looked back to earlier posts for holiday greetings -- a version of the growing snowball poem above was first posted in 2012 and here, from 2010, is a Christmas verse that celebrates pi:
Thursday, December 15, 2016
Remembering Thomas Schelling (1921-2016)
On December 13, Nobel-prize-winning economist Thomas Schelling (b 1921) died. I had the privilege of meeting this outstanding scholar in Cambridge, MA back in 1980 when I dropped by his office after hearing him lecture at the Kennedy School of Government. I became very interested in his ideas of critical mass (found along with lots of other good stuff in Micromotives and Macrobehavior and eventually included the topic in a textbook that I wrote for a liberal arts mathematics course, "Mathematical Thinking," that I helped to develop at Bloomsburg University.
I want to honor Schelling with a poem, but . . .
I
can’t
find a
poem for
Thomas Schelling – thus
I am compelled to write this Fib.
Thanks for thinking well, for sharing your keen thoughts with us.
I want to honor Schelling with a poem, but . . .
I
can’t
find a
poem for
Thomas Schelling – thus
I am compelled to write this Fib.
Thanks for thinking well, for sharing your keen thoughts with us.
(Fibonacci Numbers: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 . . .)
Monday, December 12, 2016
When one isn't enough ... words from a Cuban poet
Last week I traveled (as part of an organized people-to-people program) to Cuba. I will need many days to sort and digest and organize the details of that experience.
Neither poetry nor mathematics was part of our Cuba schedule but I did have a chance to visit the sparse collection at La Moderna Poesia in Havana and to purchase their only two bilingual poetry collections (by poets José Martí and Nicolás Guillén). The PoetryFoundation website has introduced me to the work of Cuban poet Omar Pérez (son of Ernesto "Che" Guevara) and I found there, at this link, Pérez's poem "The Progression" -- which includes some mathematical ideas.
The Progression by Omar Pérez
translated by Kristin Dykstra
When one isn’t enough, you need two
when two aren’t enough, you need four
with four the progression begins, moving toward a number
that schoolteachers will call absurd.
Neither poetry nor mathematics was part of our Cuba schedule but I did have a chance to visit the sparse collection at La Moderna Poesia in Havana and to purchase their only two bilingual poetry collections (by poets José Martí and Nicolás Guillén). The PoetryFoundation website has introduced me to the work of Cuban poet Omar Pérez (son of Ernesto "Che" Guevara) and I found there, at this link, Pérez's poem "The Progression" -- which includes some mathematical ideas.
The Progression by Omar Pérez
translated by Kristin Dykstra
When one isn’t enough, you need two
when two aren’t enough, you need four
with four the progression begins, moving toward a number
that schoolteachers will call absurd.
Monday, November 28, 2016
Celebrate MATH-POETRY at JMM (1-5-17) in Atlanta
Repeating what has become an annual tradition, the Joint Mathematics Meetings of 2017 in Atlanta will include a poetry reading.
Thursday January 5, 2017, 5:30 p.m.-7:00 p.m.
Regency Ballroom VII, Ballroom Level, Hyatt Regency
Here is info about the reading and how to participate: Poetry + Math, organized by Gizem Karaali, Pomona College; Lawrence M. Lesser, University of Texas at El Paso; and Douglas Norton, Villanova University; Thursday, January 5, 5:30–7:00 pm. All who are interested in mathematical poetry and/or mathematical art are invited. Though we do not discourage last-minute decisions to participate, we invite and encourage poets to submit poetry (no more than three poems, no longer than five minutes) and a bio in advance—and, as a result, be listed on our printed program. Inquiries and submissions (by December 15, 2016) may be made to Gizem Karaali (gizem.karaali@pomona.edu). Sponsors for this event are the Journal of Humanistic Mathematics and SIGMAA ARTS. A complete program for the Mathematics Meetings is available here.
Regency Ballroom VII, Ballroom Level, Hyatt Regency
Friday, November 25, 2016
Number-rhymes from Muriel Spark
A dozen years ago I visited Edinburgh and there became acquainted with the poetry of Scottish writer Muriel Spark (1918-2006) -- prior to that visit I had known Spark only as a novelist. Today -- prompted by Thanksgiving celebration with grandchildren -- I have remembered an English rhyme that my own grandmother teased me with in childhood, "Going to St Ives" and, from there, I've recalled a pair of Spark's rhymes that follow a similar pattern. I offer them below; despite strong rhyme, these are not entirely light fare--instead, they make us aware of the sad multiplication of bonds and wounds . . .
Conundrum by Muriel Spark
As I was going to Handover Fists
I met a man with seven wrists.
The seven wrists had seven hands;
Conundrum by Muriel Spark
As I was going to Handover Fists
I met a man with seven wrists.
The seven wrists had seven hands;
Monday, November 21, 2016
An immeasurable continuum
This poem by Emily Warn (a founder of PoetryFoundation.org) uses mathematical terminology to introduce us to the immeasurable horror of death by slow torture. May our nation never again engage in such atrocities!
The Vanishing Point by Emily Warn
You slow down to watch cumulus clouds stream across the
sky. You choose a more circuitous route home and pass a
tree with white bags tied around random apples. The apples
remind you of clouds, how each hangs in the sky, singular
yet part of a flock. Each item in the flock is a coordinate of
earth and sky, enumerating space. The flocks of apples and
clouds are actual infinities, an endless collection of discrete
items that one can conceivably count to the end. This is
The Vanishing Point by Emily Warn
You slow down to watch cumulus clouds stream across the
sky. You choose a more circuitous route home and pass a
tree with white bags tied around random apples. The apples
remind you of clouds, how each hangs in the sky, singular
yet part of a flock. Each item in the flock is a coordinate of
earth and sky, enumerating space. The flocks of apples and
clouds are actual infinities, an endless collection of discrete
items that one can conceivably count to the end. This is
Friday, November 18, 2016
A well-constructed language
California math teacher, poet and editor, Carol Dorf is a vital force in the production and dissemination of mathy poems. A blog SEARCH using her name will find links to all of my mentions of her activity. Here is one such link -- to my list of titles of mathy poems in Talking-Writing, an online journal for which Dorf is poetry editor. Dorf's poem below speaks of Ada Lovelace, a math-woman who has been featured herein on July 16, 2015 and September 18, 2015.
![]() |
Mathematics is "a well-constructed language." |
Dorf's "Ada" first appeared in Volume 14 of The Mom Egg Review.
Tuesday, November 15, 2016
Poetry and Protest
One of the fine new anthologies of 2016 is Of Poetry and Protest: From Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin, published by W W Norton -- put together by Phil Cushway (Compiler), Michael Warr (Editor), and Victoria Smith (Photographer). Here, from that collection, are the opening stanzas of Marilyn Nelson's "Cells and Windows" -- a poem that gains much of its power from the awful truth conveyed by its numbers.
Cells and Windows by Marilyn Nelson
after work by neogeo painter Peter Halley
Black men in their prime
working years, especially
those without a high school
diploma, are much more likely
to be in jail than white men are.
(a) true (b) true
Cells and Windows by Marilyn Nelson
after work by neogeo painter Peter Halley
Black men in their prime
working years, especially
those without a high school
diploma, are much more likely
to be in jail than white men are.
(a) true (b) true
Labels:
Emmett Till,
Marilyn Nelson,
Peter Halley,
protest,
Trayvon Martin
Wednesday, November 9, 2016
So much depends on . . . normality
<< >>
I found an lovely little autumn poem (after William Carlos Williams' "The Red Wheelbarrow") by Michael Khmelnitsky -- who declined to let me use it herein, and so I offer a link to it -- enjoy "The Gaussian Function."
<< >>
Monday, November 7, 2016
Happy Birthday, Marie Curie
Today, November 7, is the birthday of Marie Curie (1867-1934, Nobel prize in physics, 1903). Curie is celebrated in this poem by Richard Aston, first posted in this blog on December 6, 2014 along with two other math-science-themed poems.
Scientist by Richard Aston
It took more than a figure, face, skin, and hair
for me to become Marie Curie,
wife of simple, smiling, selective, Pierre
who could recognize — because he was one — my genius.
Scientist by Richard Aston
It took more than a figure, face, skin, and hair
for me to become Marie Curie,
wife of simple, smiling, selective, Pierre
who could recognize — because he was one — my genius.
Thursday, November 3, 2016
Calculating costs of pollution ... and other news
Recently I was browsing through an oldish collection, The Best American Poetry 1999 (edited by Robert Bly) where I found and liked this poem by Marcia Southwick -- a poem that drew me in with its anti-pollution attitudes and its enumeration of some of the costs of pollution.
A Star Is Born in the Eagle Nebula by Marcia Southwick
To Larry Levis, 1946–1996
They’ve finally admitted that trying to save oil-soaked
seabirds doesn’t work. You can wash them, rinse them
with a high-pressure nozzle, feed them activated charcoal
to absorb toxic chemicals, & test them for anemia, but the oil
still disrupts the microscopic alignment of feathers that creates
a kind of wet suit around the body. (Besides, it costs $6oo to wash
the oil slick off a penguin & $32,000 to clean an Alaskan seabird.)
A Star Is Born in the Eagle Nebula by Marcia Southwick
To Larry Levis, 1946–1996
They’ve finally admitted that trying to save oil-soaked
seabirds doesn’t work. You can wash them, rinse them
with a high-pressure nozzle, feed them activated charcoal
to absorb toxic chemicals, & test them for anemia, but the oil
still disrupts the microscopic alignment of feathers that creates
a kind of wet suit around the body. (Besides, it costs $6oo to wash
the oil slick off a penguin & $32,000 to clean an Alaskan seabird.)
Monday, October 24, 2016
Geometry -- in art and poetry
St. Louis poet Constance Levy is an acclaimed author of children's poetry -- I found her poem "Madinat as Salam" (included below) in the collection, Heart to Heart, (Edited by Jan Greenberg; Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2001), a beautifully presented and illustrated anthology of poems inspired by American art. Enjoy!
Frank Stella. Madinat as Salam III 1971. Acrylic on canvas |
Wednesday, October 19, 2016
Make Something of Nothing ... with Bob Dylan
The puzzle of nothing actually being something is central to our use of numbers -- and I use it today as an excuse to link to a Bob Dylan song and celebrate his recent Nobel prize. Below I offer one (the 3rd, of six) of the stanzas of "Too Much of Nothing" -- followed by a link to the complete lyrics. (And for those readers seeking other poems of nothing, here is a link to blog poetry from 2011 about division by zero, this link leads to making something of nothing . . . and this link leads to several nothing links -- it was found via a blog search using the search term "zero.")
from Too Much of Nothing by Bob Dylan
Too much of nothing
Can make a man abuse a king
He can walk the streets and boast like most
But he wouldn’t know a thing
Now, it’s all been done before
It’s all been written in the book
But when there’s too much of nothing
Nobody should look
Here is a link to the complete lyrics of "Too Much of Nothing." Enjoy.
from Too Much of Nothing by Bob Dylan
Too much of nothing
Can make a man abuse a king
He can walk the streets and boast like most
But he wouldn’t know a thing
Now, it’s all been done before
It’s all been written in the book
But when there’s too much of nothing
Nobody should look
Here is a link to the complete lyrics of "Too Much of Nothing." Enjoy.
Saturday, October 15, 2016
Have a Happy "Hamilton Day"
April 15-23, 2016 is Maths Week in Ireland.
This blog adds some poetry to the celebratory fare -- here is a link (from a 2011 posting) to a poem by Hamilton, himself and this January, 2016 link leads to a sonnet about Hamilton by poet Iggy McGovern.
Friday, October 14, 2016
From order to chaos -- "Fig Tree Rag"
Robert Dawson, a mathematician and poet from Halifax, Nova Scotia, is wide-ranging in the mathematics that he includes in poetry. Here is a link to my posting of his "Statistical Lament." Still others may be found with a SEARCH using the poet's name.
Dawson's poem below is motivated by chaos and period doublings -- and their patterns -- a complicated system that, under certain conditions approaches a number called Feigenbaum's constant. (Mitchell Feigenbaum is a mathematical physicist who did pioneering work in chaos theory. "Feigenbaum" is a German surname meaning "Fig Tree" -- hence the title of the poem.) Probably you will want to read the poem aloud to get a feel for the rhythmic patterns -- and chaos -- that Dawson has designed for us.
Fig Tree Rag (after Scott Joplin) by Robert Dawson
The music drifts across the room:
from clarinet and saxophone
a sliding stream of melody,
piano chords beneath it, and
upon the cymbal and the snare
the drummer paints a lazy beat
with wire brushes, regular
and cool and uninflected as
a music teacher’s metronome.
Dawson's poem below is motivated by chaos and period doublings -- and their patterns -- a complicated system that, under certain conditions approaches a number called Feigenbaum's constant. (Mitchell Feigenbaum is a mathematical physicist who did pioneering work in chaos theory. "Feigenbaum" is a German surname meaning "Fig Tree" -- hence the title of the poem.) Probably you will want to read the poem aloud to get a feel for the rhythmic patterns -- and chaos -- that Dawson has designed for us.
Fig Tree Rag (after Scott Joplin) by Robert Dawson
The music drifts across the room:
from clarinet and saxophone
a sliding stream of melody,
piano chords beneath it, and
upon the cymbal and the snare
the drummer paints a lazy beat
with wire brushes, regular
and cool and uninflected as
a music teacher’s metronome.
Tuesday, October 11, 2016
She argued for Newton's physics
Here, by Voltaire, is a poem about mathematician/scientist Émilie du Châtelet (1706-1749) -- who explained Newton's physics but was not remembered for her own work as she should have been.
At this link, one may begin to learn about du Châtelet's many contributions.
The Divine Émilie by Voltaire (1694-1778)
Here's a portrait of my Émilie:
She's both a beauty and a friend to me.
Her keen imagination is always in bloom.
Her noble mind brightens every room.
She's possessed of charm and wit,
Though sometimes shows too much of it.
She has, I assure you, a genius rare.
With Horace and Newton, she can compare.
Yet, she will sit for hours and hours
With people who bore her
And card-playing gamblers.
At this link, one may begin to learn about du Châtelet's many contributions.
The Divine Émilie by Voltaire (1694-1778)
Here's a portrait of my Émilie:
She's both a beauty and a friend to me.
Her keen imagination is always in bloom.
Her noble mind brightens every room.
She's possessed of charm and wit,
Though sometimes shows too much of it.
She has, I assure you, a genius rare.
With Horace and Newton, she can compare.
Yet, she will sit for hours and hours
With people who bore her
And card-playing gamblers.
Labels:
Emilie du Chatelet,
Isaac Newton,
Voltaire
Thursday, October 6, 2016
Be astonished -- National Poetry Day (British)
Today I celebrate British partnership with Romanian poetry!
One of the internet treasures I have found is to Contemporary Literature Press, the online publishing house at the University of Bucharest which offers bilingual (Romanian and English) presentations of both classical and contemporary work. The creators say this about themselves:
The Contemporary Literature Press, under The University of Bucharest,
in conjunction with The British Council, The Romanian Cultural Institute,
and The Embassy of Ireland.
We publish poetry, fiction, drama and criticism, in the original and in translation,
whether English or Romanian.
We are a well-fused group of staff and graduate students,
very enthusiastic about our work.
This particular link from Contemporary Literature Press celebrates British-Romanian week and includes a poem with a bit of mathematics by Australian-born, London-resident poet Katherine Gallagher; I offer it here and invite you also to visit its Romanian translation.
Take-Off by Katherine Gallagher
(after a line by Derek Walcott)
Have you seen the way the day grows
around you, neither perpendicular
nor horizontal—
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Generating a sonnet -- human vs computer
News last month from UC Berkeley's School of Information described a computer that writes poetry. In particular, it writes sonnets. This article describes in much detail the creation of several sonnet stanzas. This link offers the winner in Dartmouth's 2016 PoetiX sonnet-generation competition -- in which Berkeley earned a second. Here, from an article in Slate, is an example of what Berkeley's generator produced:
Kindred pens my path lies where a flock of
feast in natures mysteries an adept
you are my songs my soft skies shine above
love after my restless eyes I have kept.
Kindred pens my path lies where a flock of
feast in natures mysteries an adept
you are my songs my soft skies shine above
love after my restless eyes I have kept.
Wednesday, September 28, 2016
A Nest of Worlds -- in verse by Margaret Cavendish
Margaret Cavendish (1623-1673) was an English aristocrat, scientist, writer and philosopher. The following interesting and charming poem by Cavendish I found in A Quark for Mister Mark: 101 Poems about Science, edited by Maurice Riordan and Jon Turney (Faber & Faber, 2000).
Of many Worlds in this World by Margaret Cavendish
Just like as in a Nest of Boxes round,
Degrees of Sizes in each Box are found:
So, in this World, may many others be
Thinner and less, and less still by degree:
Although they are not subject to our sense,
A World may be no bigger than Two-pence.
Of many Worlds in this World by Margaret Cavendish
Just like as in a Nest of Boxes round,
Degrees of Sizes in each Box are found:
So, in this World, may many others be
Thinner and less, and less still by degree:
Although they are not subject to our sense,
A World may be no bigger than Two-pence.
Monday, September 26, 2016
The Bloomsburg Fair -- with theorems and lies . . .
Along the north branch of the Susquehanna River in east-central Pennsylvania lies the town of Bloomsburg -- known for Bloomsburg University (where I taught math for a bunch of years) and for the Bloomsburg Fair -- an annual celebration that attracts hundreds of thousands of people during each last week of September.
I grew up loving fairs -- in my hometown of Indiana, Pennsylvania, the last week of August brought the Indiana County Fair where we celebrated, with livestock and a carnival, the end of summer vacation.
More than twenty years ago I gathered some of my Bloomsburg Fair memories in a poem. The entire poem is found at this link; below I offer a sample of the mathy imagery from the poem.
from The Bloomsburg Fair by JoAnne Growney
. . .
In front of side-show tents,
a barker barks his come-on-ins.
Why don't my students receive theorems
as willingly as passersby
accept his lies?
. . .
If parallels will never meet—
then here's a man with snakes for hair,
and there's a woman with three eyes.
This poem appears in the anthology, COMMON WEALTH: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania, Edited by Marjorie Maddox and Jerry Wemple, (2005, PSU Press).
I grew up loving fairs -- in my hometown of Indiana, Pennsylvania, the last week of August brought the Indiana County Fair where we celebrated, with livestock and a carnival, the end of summer vacation.
More than twenty years ago I gathered some of my Bloomsburg Fair memories in a poem. The entire poem is found at this link; below I offer a sample of the mathy imagery from the poem.
from The Bloomsburg Fair by JoAnne Growney
. . .
In front of side-show tents,
a barker barks his come-on-ins.
Why don't my students receive theorems
as willingly as passersby
accept his lies?
. . .
If parallels will never meet—
then here's a man with snakes for hair,
and there's a woman with three eyes.
This poem appears in the anthology, COMMON WEALTH: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania, Edited by Marjorie Maddox and Jerry Wemple, (2005, PSU Press).
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Math-woman, be bold!
During these days in which discrimination against math-women happens again and again I have wanted to write a poem that celebrates us. My efforts at traditional verse seemed whining. Sense left me. Eventually this came:
M ultiply
A xioms,
T risect
H yperbolas,
W ager
O rthogonal
M artingales
A ll
N ight !
M ultiply
A xioms,
T risect
H yperbolas,
W ager
O rthogonal
M artingales
A ll
N ight !
Dear reader, please share your own words -- via comments below!
Monday, September 19, 2016
A rumor (in verse) about Alfred Nobel
Before the poem a bit of history about its source of publication:
The Humanistic Mathematics Network Newsletter (HMNN) was founded by Alvin White (1925-2009) of Harvey Mudd College in the summer of 1987. The Newsletter was later renamed The Humanistic Mathematics Network Journal (HMNJ). The last issue of the HMNJ was published in 2004 -- and a current, related (online, open-accesss) journal is the Journal of Humanistic Mathematics (JHM). Recently the digital archive of the full run of the HMNN/HMNJ (1987-2004) has become available at this link.I was an active participant in HMNJ -- contributing articles and serving for several years as poetry editor -- and have enjoyed browsing the archives. One of my articles, "Mathematics and Poetry: Isolated or Integrated" is available here (Issue 6, 1991).
Explore!
There's lots more!
Back in Issue 3 of HMNJ (from 1988) I found these entertaining lines from topologist and math historian William Dunham -- setting to rhyme an an apocryphal tale of why there is no Nobel prize in mathematics. For Whom Nobel Tolls by William Dunham
It is well-known that Nobel Prizes
Come in many shapes and sizes.
But one is missing from the list --
The Nobel Math Prize does not exist.
Labels:
Alfred Nobel,
Humanistic Mathematics,
William Dunham
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Keyboard characters make a poem . . .
Here's poem found in an old email from my Bloomsburg friend, Janice B. Its authors turn out to be Fred Bremmer and Steve Kroese and they penned it around 1990, using computer keyboard characters, during their student days at Calvin College. Enjoy!
< > ! * ' ' # read as Waka waka bang splat tick tick hash
^ " ` $ $ - Caret quote back-tick dollar dollar dash
! * = @ $ _ Bang splat equal at dollar underscore
% * < > ~ # 4 Percent splat waka waka tilde number 4
& [ ] . . / Ampersand bracket bracket dot dot slash
| { , , SYSTEM HALTED Vertical-bar curly-bracket comma comma CRASH.
___________________________________
< > ! * ' ' # read as Waka waka bang splat tick tick hash
^ " ` $ $ - Caret quote back-tick dollar dollar dash
! * = @ $ _ Bang splat equal at dollar underscore
% * < > ~ # 4 Percent splat waka waka tilde number 4
& [ ] . . / Ampersand bracket bracket dot dot slash
| { , , SYSTEM HALTED Vertical-bar curly-bracket comma comma CRASH.
Labels:
Bloomsburg,
computer keyboard,
Fred Bremmer,
Steve Kroese
Tuesday, September 13, 2016
A Fib (a perfect circle) -- and some math-po links
1 Not
1 one
2 circle
3 is perfect
5 yet the idea
8 of circle's useful every day.
The beauty of images and the ideas they represent is central in both mathematics and poetry. A wonderful resource for works that join these two is the literary website TalkingWriting,com -- whose poetry editor is Carol Dorf, also a math teacher. Here is a link to a wonderful TW essay from a few years back, "Math Girl Fights Back" by Karen J Ohlson. This article by Dorf, "Why Poets Sometimes think in Numbers," introduces a 2012 collection of mathy poems. Another collection was posted in the Spring 2016 issue. In addition, at the TalkingWriting website, you can enter the search term "math" -- as I did -- and be offered 5 pages of links to consider.
Labels:
Carol Dorf,
circle,
Karen Ohlson,
perfect,
talkingwriting.com
Friday, September 9, 2016
Division by Zero
At Victoria University in Melbourne, novelist, playwright and poet Tom Petsinis also teaches mathematics. He participated in the 2016 Bridges Math-Arts Conference in Finland this summer: here are two of his poems from the 2016 Bridges Poetry Anthology -- and each of them plays with mathematical ideas in new and thoughtful (sometimes amusing) ways. "Zeno's Paradox" follows this initial poem. (Names and links for other anthology poets are given below.)
Division by Zero by Tom Petsinis
She could’ve been our grandmother
Warning us of poisonous mushrooms ‒
To stress her point she'd scratch
The taboo bold with crimson chalk.
It should never be used to divide,
Or we'd be howled from lined yard
To pit where cruel paradoxes ruled.
Her warnings tempted us even more:
Young, growing full in confidence,
We’d prove the impossible for fun ‒
Nothing she said could restrain us
From showing two is equal to one.
Division by Zero by Tom Petsinis
She could’ve been our grandmother
Warning us of poisonous mushrooms ‒
To stress her point she'd scratch
The taboo bold with crimson chalk.
It should never be used to divide,
Or we'd be howled from lined yard
To pit where cruel paradoxes ruled.
Her warnings tempted us even more:
Young, growing full in confidence,
We’d prove the impossible for fun ‒
Nothing she said could restrain us
From showing two is equal to one.
Labels:
Australia,
Bridges,
Tom Petsinis,
Zeno,
zero
Tuesday, September 6, 2016
A counting rhyme, a riddle
During the summer I had lots of activities with grandchildren -- they all love to read and one of the books we enjoyed together was Counting Rhymes (selected by Shona McKellar, a Dorling Kindersley book, 1993). Here are a rhyme and a riddle from that collection.
Let's Send a Rocket by Kit Patrickson
TEN, NINE, EIGHT, We're counting each second,
SEVEN, SIX, FIVE . . . And soon it will boom!
We'll send up a rocket, Get ready for . . . TWO;
And it will be LIVE . Get ready to go . . .
FIVE, FOUR, THREE . . . It's TWO--and it's--ONE!
It's ready to zoom! We're OFF! It's ZERO!
Four stiff-standers,
Four dilly-danders,
Two lookers,
Two crookers,
And a wig-wag.
Let's Send a Rocket by Kit Patrickson
TEN, NINE, EIGHT, We're counting each second,
SEVEN, SIX, FIVE . . . And soon it will boom!
We'll send up a rocket, Get ready for . . . TWO;
And it will be LIVE . Get ready to go . . .
FIVE, FOUR, THREE . . . It's TWO--and it's--ONE!
It's ready to zoom! We're OFF! It's ZERO!
RIDDLE -- What animal do these clues describe?
Four dilly-danders,
Two lookers,
Two crookers,
And a wig-wag.
Labels:
counting rhyme,
Kit Patrickson,
riddle,
Shona McKellar
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Twelveness -- a Fibonacci poem from G4G
Science writer, philosopher, and skeptic Martin Gardner (1914-2010) is perhaps best known for his long-running Scientific American column, "Mathematical Games." His life and work are celebrated by G4G conferences ("Gatherings for Gardner") held in even-numbered years in Atlanta. Here fans gather and present fun-mathematics to each other.
A several-time participant in G4G is Kate Jones of Kadon Enterprises, an organization devoted to the development and distribution of Game Puzzles. Below in a Fibonacci poem created for the 2016 G4G Jones tells the history of her game-puzzle enterprise.
TWELVENESS by Kate Jones
1 Martin
1 Gardner
2 Long ago
3 Wrote about pentominoes,
5 Brainchild of young Solomon Golomb,
8 The coolest recmath set in all the world.
A several-time participant in G4G is Kate Jones of Kadon Enterprises, an organization devoted to the development and distribution of Game Puzzles. Below in a Fibonacci poem created for the 2016 G4G Jones tells the history of her game-puzzle enterprise.
Many Fibonacci poems use the Fibonacci number sequence
to determine the numbers of syllables in successive lines of a poem.
In the following poem, it is the numbers of words that are counted.
A pentomino is a plane geometric figure formed by joining five equal squares edge to edge.
There are twelve differently-shaped pentominos; this number gives the title of Jones's poem.
A pentomino is a plane geometric figure formed by joining five equal squares edge to edge.
There are twelve differently-shaped pentominos; this number gives the title of Jones's poem.
TWELVENESS by Kate Jones
1 Martin
1 Gardner
2 Long ago
3 Wrote about pentominoes,
5 Brainchild of young Solomon Golomb,
8 The coolest recmath set in all the world.
Labels:
Fibonacci,
Kate Jones,
Martin Gardner,
pentomino
Monday, August 29, 2016
Math-play via verse (with George Darley)
A recent email from Colm Mulcahy -- who seeks out all things Irish -- alerted me to Dublin poet and math-text author, George Darley (1795-1846), and an online archived collection of his poems. Colm's email had opened the collection to pages 70-71 and there I found -- and had fun reading -- this poem that plays with math.
A Poetical Problem. by George Darley
Once on a time, at evening hour,
A sweet, and dewy-bosom'd Flower
Was cradling up to rest ;
A Pilgrim, wandering near her bed,
Raised, with his staff, her drooping head,
And thus the Flower addrest :
"From matin-rise to moonlight hour,
Tell me, my pearly-crested Flower,
How many a lucid gem
Hath left the high, cavernal air,
To form upon thy queenly hair
A rainbow diadem?"
A Poetical Problem. by George Darley
Once on a time, at evening hour,
A sweet, and dewy-bosom'd Flower
Was cradling up to rest ;
A Pilgrim, wandering near her bed,
Raised, with his staff, her drooping head,
And thus the Flower addrest :
"From matin-rise to moonlight hour,
Tell me, my pearly-crested Flower,
How many a lucid gem
Hath left the high, cavernal air,
To form upon thy queenly hair
A rainbow diadem?"
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