Friday, March 14, 2008

Poetry Friday Mash-Up!

Today is Pi day, Einstein's birthday, and Jama has asked us to share a favorite Dylan lyric. So, in honor of all these events, I have a bit of everything today. Let's call it a Poetry Friday mash-up!

Let's begin with Einstein. This first poem was written by Einstein himself.
Watch the stars, and from them learn.
To the Master's honor all must turn,
each in its track, without a sound,
forever tracing Newton's ground.
At Poets.org you can read a wonderful prose poem by A. Van Jordan entitled Einstein Defining Special Relativity.

In 1906, A.C. Orr published this poem about pi in Literary Digest. The number of letters in each word corresponds to the digits in pi (3.14159 ...).
Now I, even I, would celebrate
In rhymes inapt, the great
Immortal Syracusan rivaled nevermore
Who in his wondrous lore
Passed on before
Left men his guidance how to circles mensurate.
Finally, here is one of my favorite lyrics from Dylan. These lines come from the song Every Grain of Sand.
I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there's someone there, other times it's only me.
I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand.
The round up and Dylan homage is being hosted today by Jama at Jama Rattigan 's Alphabet Soup. Please stop by for some wonderful poetry to begin your weekend. Before you go, be sure to check out this week's poetry stretch results. Happy poetry Friday, all!

8 comments:

  1. Wonderful mash-up, Tricia! "Every Grain of Sand" is beautiful -- definitely showing Dylan's philosophical side. Thanks!

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  2. Love the Einstein poem (who knew?) adn the Dylan lyric especially. I surrender. Clearly, I'm going to have to investigate Dylan.

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  3. Yes, I never knew Einstein wrote poetry either. Thanks for sharing!

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  4. Nice mashup here! I had forgotten it's Pi day. My favorite Halloween costume ever was to wear one of those orange pumpkin shirts with a round Pi sign on the back. :)

    That's about as mathematical as I can get.

    The Einstein poem is pretty amazing.

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  5. Had a brief double-take -- I read mensurate and had to pause --! Yes, the Immortal Syracusan did teach us to measure circles. That's a cool poem on myriad levels. Sometimes I wish we lived in the days of epigrams; all that clever wordplay. And, I love the Dylan.

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  6. Oooh,I love a good mash up...
    And Pi. Math poetry. I really admire that...

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  7. A pi poem...seems like something Gregory K. would run with. Companions for his fibs!!

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  8. Thanks for the pi poem - my students enjoyed it on Friday! :-)

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