Showing posts with label math poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label math poem. Show all posts

Monday, July 31, 2017

They Call Him The Numerator

Yeah, that's me.  The Numerator.  Freelance.
I'll work with any denominator--they all
think they're the sum of all parts, anyway.

Me--I come in, I represent myself
and no one else.  I get paid the same
whether I'm working for a 3, a

million, a square root, or some
ludicrous boutique unit. I have to say,
it's still a thrill to work as

one over one.  Gives one a bit of an
autotelic buzz.  All about a fitted whole
in a fragmented world, or some shit like that.



hans ostrom 2017

Monday, October 10, 2016

Transformation: Accountant

At the accountant's, I enter
a small room stacked with numbers.
It's a math cupboard. An assistant

deducts me from this box
to escort me to an office
where the desk is as sleek

as a panther. Someone
behind it plays a sonata
on an abacus. She wears

a tailored gray suit
with a fringe of bumble bee
fur. When the music 

of calculation ends, she says,
"Repeat after me: I owe,
and I don't owe."  "I

oh, and I don't oh,"
I say, adding, "may I pay
you in dreams?"  She says no.


hans ostrom 2016

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

"Algebra" (poem)



Corn signifies joy.
A lover's mouth represents
all the acts of confidence.
Hair is foreign and astounding.
Humanity itself is as unlikely
as its ideas.
Tonight I told myself,
"Allow yourself to be astonished.
Let corn, for instance, equal joy."



hans ostrom 1975/2014