Mathematics Pays Court To Literature

Sarah Seff Rolfe was my poetry mentor.  I recall spending many evenings listening to her helpful criticisms.  She had a musical voice, which I still hear when I read her poetry.  Her book of poems, Heart and Mouth are One, was published by Terebinth Press in 1983 just before her death in 1984.  She never read the following poem of mine, but I’d like to think she would have enjoyed it.

Mathematics Pays Court to Literature

Literature appeared, leaving a castle of words, trailing silver metaphors.

Moonlight touched her face, luring her into a poetic garden.

She paused to think, then rested beside a river of flowing ideas.

Suddenly, a steady footstep echoed through the flowering shrubs.

Fearful, lest the person see her beauty rare, she enveloped herself in a cloak of ambiguities.

The sound grew nearer.  It was Mathematics-tall, slender, and with an exactness that made her tremble, he spoke:

“Oh, Mistress of Language, why must you hide your elegant beauty?  I beseech you to glance at me.”

Literature coyly smiled, and seemed to laugh beneath the protective cloak.

“I have many suitors.  I am courted by Linguistics.  What can you offer me?”

“I have manifolds, singular points, vector fields of thriving grain, coordinate rings of ruby and diamond.  All these I offer thee.”

Mathematics kissed her cheek.  Literature blushed and turned away.

“You are too bold , Sir.”

“It is my way to come to a swift conclusion.”

Then the two embraced in a shadowy corner of infinite space.

And the galaxies winked to see the pair linked

as they rode a nebula of possibilities…