By Pup Horst
Playful math
Smelled
As sweet as pie
Happy Pi Day, everyone! As mentioned in our call for submissions, Math Values is celebrating this year with Pi-ku poems written by the community. Thank you everyone who sent us your poems!
A Pi-ku is a short form poem based on the traditional Haiku; it consists of three lines, the first line with three syllables, the second with one syllable, and the last with four. As in, 3.14, a common if rather imprecise approximation for π.
We’ve selected close to one hundred of our favorite Pi-kus we received this past month. I’ve organized them into several genres—I’ll give a bit of commentary for each new genre, but for the most part I’ll let the poems speak for themselves.
Finally, please note that some of these do not perfectly conform to the Pi-ku form, but in the interest of having as full a community-wide celebration as possible, we decided to accept a wide range of submissions. Similarly, all punctuation and capitalization are left as the poets originally had them.
He assessed
Pi:
Archimedes
Our first genre of Pi-ku: Those directly about the number itself! This was the second-most common genre we received, though it might not look like it. This is because we receive several identical copies of this next poem—perhaps the very kernel of the Pi-ku form.
Three point one
Four
One five nine two
Several other entries in this genre focus on the decimal expansion of π, whereas others contemplate other properties of the number.
Pi is why
Our
World is perfect
Pi and I
Are
Infinity
Why is pi
So
Insanely long?
Digits grow
Fast
Never repeating!
Pi is wild,
Plus,
Never stops, bro
Pi goes on
Long
Never repeating
The number
Pi:
Irrational
Rational?
No.
Irrational!
Me plus pi
Equals
A circle’s kiss!
Pi times d
Is
Circumference
Newton did
Pi
Approximate.
Estimate
With
Buffon’s needle
Three one four
One
Five nine two six
Pi is this
in hex:
three point two four.
Best Kind Of
Pie:
Three-point-one-four
Pie is cool.
Pi?
Even better.
Number pi
You
Are delicious
for MAA I
try . . .
π poetry
Our next genre consists of those Pi-kus about the very concept of Pi-ku. How meta!
You are free
To
write a pi-ku
Three Point One
Four
Pi-Ku Poem
three-one-four
not
five-seven-five
Haiku about pi
With only eight syllables
Not really haiku
Pi-kus are hard.
But,
Pie goes harder.
π-topped pie . . .
spurs
Pi-ku anew
smörgåsbord—
MAA’s
Pi-ku galore
What is math?
Fun!
So study it.
We return to a mathematical genre of Pi-ku—this time not about the number π itself, but about other mathematical topics or math itself. These next two used extended forms, one is two Pi-kus glued together, and the other is a Pi-ku extended to six lines.
Limit of
One
Minus sine squared.
Riemann’s guess
Z
Eta of s.
Euclid said:
Primes
Go ever on
Like
An infinite chain
From here to the heavens, skipping rocks.
The remainder of the Pi-kus in this genre use a more standard form.
I like Math.
No,
I ADORE Math!
Ah-ha! I
solved
A math puzzle.
Not enough
scratch
paper on Earth.
Happiness
Is
Solving problems
Mathematics
Is
silly puzzles
Math reveals
Truth
About the world
Always show
more
supporting work.
My brain is
A
Calculator
Pulling up
To
The math function.
With fluxions
Did
Newton figure.
Epsilon,
A
Tiny number.
Limits grow
Close,
never reaching past
Lims approach
Zero
But never quite reach
Approach close
But
Never reach.
Infinite
sums
are very fun.
Spiraling
to
infinity.
Numbers dance
Through
Infinite paths
three, two, then
one
numbers are fun
Numbers dance
In
Circles forever!
A circle
Looks
Both straight and round
Cardioids
are
my love and joy.
Triangles
are
very pointy
Proofs and tricks
Are
everywhere.
Math is fun
Oh
Proofs amaze me!
Discrete Math
With
Proofs and Logic
In discrete,
We
Learn some cool stuff.
This is math.
So,
why no numbers?
Negation,
Proof,
Contradiction!
Always true
Means
Tautology
Logical,
Not?
Give it some thought.
Solve for x
Now
Think logically
Everyone
should
learn math in school
Six is scared
Why?
Seven ate nine.
I had this math dream.
A haiku that serves as a
Pi mnemonic verse.
Our next genre was a rare one but a delightful reinterpretation of the Pi-ku idea: Encode the decimal expansion of π in a poem. Our next one is a modified Haiku where the number of letters in each word is a digit of π:
How I mend a crack:
Beautiful pi loving those
Who spout nonsense.
The other such submission we received used the first letter of each word in a Haiku to encode the digits of π. The encoding scheme was
1. One
2. tWo
3. tHree
4. fouR
5. Five
6. siX
7. Seven
8. Eight
9. Nine
and the poem itself is
Hell, or ring of fire
No waxing fears hold faith's end
Next Spring new hope waits
Eating is
my
favorite thing
My favorite Pi-kus: Food-focused! Most of these reference the number itself and the resulting pun, but a few involve unrelated foodstuffs.
The Pi Day
is
for pi and pie.
print a π—
on
pie with patience
filled with pies . . .
Year
of the Wood Snake
Pi Day pie—
pair
strawberry pear
Vanilla
for
Pi a la mode
Pi is not
Just
A tasty dish
cutie pie . . .
try
pecan Pi pies
I love pi.
Lots.
Do you love pie?
I love pie
It’s
Made of numbers
I love pi
No,
Not the number
Pi Day prompt
whets
my appetite
This year, not
Pie—
Hamantaschen
Sweet Apples
Spice
Baked Perfection
Donuts are tasty,
Go to take a bite nom-nom.
Huh? It was a mug.
Matcha is
the
best drink to date
Warm Coffee
Sip
I feel happy
Some food for
Thought:
Turmeric Root
Pie tastes good
Dang
Extra belt notch
Spirals twist
In
Never-ending waves
Everything else: The miscellaneous genre of Pi-kus! Perhaps unsurprisingly, many of these involve the struggles of a math student.
Out of Bed?
No.
Ten more Minutes.
Why must I
Do
All my homework?
The classroom,
liv
-ing, speaks to me.
Don't forget
to
include the sea.
My dog, Finn
Is
Scared of bubbles
Sudoku
Is
not from Japan
Tax forms filed
Due
Digits endure
Stack is full
RAM,
it crashes again.
On the way
To
The top I go!
Thank you again everyone who sent us poetry! If you weren’t able to this year, you have plenty of time to work on your poems for next year!
We have one final poem for you—this one is a small math puzzle for you to work out. Happy Pi Day!
If A equals 1,
B, 2, …, and Z, 26,
show PI is square.
Pup Horst is currently faculty at Case Western Reserve University and the deputy editor of MAA Math Values. While xyr work was originally in lower-dimensional higher category theory, these days xe focuses primarily on pedagogy and teaching. In addition to finding xem dancing xyr way through math classes, you can find xem working with xyr cohort of Posse scholars, a group of diverse, leadership students on campus xe mentors as part of xyr role as Posse Faculty Mentor.