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Mathematical Visual Poem

Bashō

2009
Selected by Evelyn Lamb for the American Mathematical Society’s Page a Day Calendar — April 23
The April 23 page of the American Mathematical Society Page a Day Calendar, carrying Kaz Maslanka's Basho poem and an explanation of the proportional poem form
Bashō, 2009 — as it ran in the American Mathematical Society’s Page a Day Calendar, April 23. Frog = Splash(The Self − The Mind) / The Old Pond + Noise

An old pond — a frog jumps in — the sound of water. Not a translation. The poem is built as an expanded similar triangles poem — six terms across three equal ratios: Frog is to The Self as Noise is to The Mind as Splash is to the Old Pond. Subtract one numerator from another together with their matching denominators, so that (Frog − Noise) over (The Self − The Mind) equals Splash over the Old Pond, solve for Frog, and the equation above is what algebra hands back.

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