Our Mathematical Genius

[dedalus]

In Ballygadree on the banks of the Lee

not far from the great town of Cork,

there lived a young man with a brain like a trap

who gobbled up math with a knife and a fork.

 

Einstein’s all right, Heisenberg is a shite,

said the local young savant and prodigy,

connectivity is present in pure Relativity

but Uncertainty is balls and codology.

 

Reluctantly taking the bus up to Dublin

with Mammy’s sandwiches, with three flasks of tea,

he explicated to all them city bowsies,

wowsied them at TCD … and the crowds at UCD!

 

Great triumph altogether! Going out next morning

he was flattened by the local bus, made part of the road,

and became a little red bit of Ireland. Sympathy flowed,

and a memorial stone would ensue: It reads, 1 + 1 = 2.

[Tinker]

I can't believe I am smiling after reading about a guy you gets crushed by a bus. This is fun with a kind of Limericky feel to it though not at all using the form. How did you do that? With your command of rhythm and rhyme you manage to whimsically set your reader up for the punch line.

 

There once was a youth from Ballygadree

who's mathmatical mind was the highest degree

to Dublin he went

teaching math to a gent

then was schmooshed by a bus morbidly.

 

Sorry, I don't have your natural mastery of rhythm....this is just my hasty Limerick reaction to your poem. ~~ ~~

 

~~Tink

[tonyv]

There's a lesson in this. I sometimes watch people who are über-productive with a whole lot of envy. Then I think, hey, a bus could flatten this person tomorrow just like it would anyone else. Puts things in perspective. (And no Brendan, I don't mean you. I'm glad you were in a car and not on foot and hope you're recovery is going well. You seem to be in relatively good spirits, considering what happened.)

 

But wait, there's more! How do we know 1+1 = 2 ? I mean, why not 11? Goes to show there's always an axiom one must accept before it's possible to continue on down some pre-set course.

 

Tony