Filling the Well: Amit Ray and Yehuda Amichai

 

Fun fact: Albert Einstein was born on Pi Day—March 14, 1879.

Mathematics and poetry are the two ways to drink the beauty of truth.

 

– Amit Ray

 

 

Problem in a Math Book

by Yehuda Amichai

 

I remember a problem in a math book

about a train that leaves from place A and another train

that leaves from place B. When will they meet?

And no one ever asked what happens when they meet:

will they stop or pass each other by, or maybe collide?

 

Read the rest of the poem at Poetry Foundation.

 

 

Song from π, by aSongScout

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMq9he-5HUU

 

For more about how this song was written, click HERE.

 

 

The power of x

Choreographed by I Could Never Be a Dancer

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0-zCwSfkOo

 

 

Now it's your turn!

 

WRITE A FIBONACCI (FIB) POEM

A poetic form created by Greg Pincus that plays off the mathematical Fibonacci sequence, a "Fib" is a six line, 20 syllable poem in which each line gets its syllable count from following the Fibonacci sequence. This means the six lines have syllable counts of 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, and 8 respectively. Some would say the first number of the Fibonacci sequence is actually a zero, so imagine every Fib starting with a beat of silence.

 

WRITE A PI POEM

 

These are the first 20 digits of pi: 3.14159265358979323846 (or, if you're particularly ambitious, the first million digits). Choose one of the following variations:

• The first line of your poem should have 3 WORDS; the second line, 1 word; the third line, 4 words; and so forth. Your poem can be as long as you like, so long as you keep to the sequence.

• The first line of your poem should have 3 SYLLABLES, the second line, 1 syllable, the third line, 4 syllables, and so forth. You get the idea.

• Each word in your poem must contain the same number of LETTERS as the sequence of pi. Line breaks are up to you.

If you leave your poems in the comments, I'd love to read them!

(But no million-digit pi poems, please.)

April 1: Michelle H. Barnes and Cosmo Sheldrake

April 2: Hans Christian Andersen

April 3: Guy Finley, Anneke van Giersbergen and Árstíðir 

April 4: Joseph Campbell and Fabien Weibel

April 5: Salvador Dalí and Pilobolus

April 6: Jacob Nordby and Talking Animals

April 7: Aileen Fisher, XTC, and Takarazuka Ballet 

This week's Poetry Friday roundup is being hosted by Janice Scully at Salt City Verse. She shares a wonderful book review and interview with David Elliott about his newest children's poetry collection, At the Pond. 

You'll find the National Poetry Month kidlit events roundup at Jama's Alphabet Soup.