Monday, May 16, 2005

Poem of the Day

Pi by Wislawa Szymborska


The admirable number pi:
three point one four one.
All the following digits are also just a start,
five nine two because it never ends.
It can't be grasped, six five three five , at a glance,
eight nine, by calculation,
seven nine, through imagination,
or even three two three eight in jest, or by comparison
four six to anything
two six four three in the world.
The longest snake on earth ends at thirty-odd feet.
Same goes for fairy tale snakes, though they make it a little longer.
The caravan of digits that is pi
does not stop at the edge of the page,
but runs off the table and into the air,
over the wall, a leaf, a bird's nest, the clouds, straight into the sky,
through all the bloatedness and bottomlessness.
Oh how short, all but mouse-like is the comet's tail!
How frail is a ray of starlight, bending in any old space!
Meanwhile two three fifteen three hundred nineteen
my phone number your shirt size
the year nineteen hundred and seventy-three sixth floor
number of inhabitants sixty-five cents
hip measurement two fingers a charade and a code,
in which we find how blithe the trostle sings!
and please remain calm,
and heaven and earth shall pass away,
but not pi, that won't happen,
it still has an okay five,
and quite a fine eight,
and all but final seven,
prodding and prodding a plodding eternity
to last.

Poems New and Collected
Poems New and Collected

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

handdrummer, Szymborska's one of my favorites! I'm always happy to see her poetry. Thanks!

'O fatty dishes of love!' That line always made me smile.

handdrummer said...

I love her poetry as well. It's a constant battle to keep posting a variety of poets. I could be a happy little poetry blogger posting just her stuff, Neruda, Pinsky and Mary Oliver.

handdrummer said...

Of course then I'd have to give up Heaney, Dove, Collins, Olds, Milosz, Borges, Merwin, Brodsky, Cummings, Stevens, Roethke, Williams, Ginsberg etc..... Not going to happen. So many poems, so little blog.