酷我-北美枫

[anna]

Alice reading another math-related poem, "Rectangularization of the Morbidity Curve" (along with some upfront explanation of the metaphor). -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43A3dqTVq2E
_________________
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Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com

[[星子安娜]]

Alice reading another math-related poem, "Rectangularization of the Morbidity Curve" (along with some upfront explanation of the metaphor). -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43A3dqTVq2E
_________________
---------------------

Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com

[anna]

Rectangularization of the morbidity curve

The demographer’s desired geometry:
a hale old age and then a rapid fall –
a sudden tumble down a slope of scree
to that inevitable, oblong box.

And we agree.
“Oh, that’s the way I want to go.”
The unexpected failure of an artery
from which we never waken. We dread

the lingering morbidities ahead,
slow occlusions of cognition, bodies
angled into immobility, diapered,
and life a sad, sagged line, tethered

to an all-too-distant other end.
But then I think of you. You said it too:
“Just put me on an ice floe, send
me off. I won’t want to live.”

And yet you did. At no point on that curve
of long diminishment
were you prepared to leave,
to face the cliff. You wanted life until its end.

Then I think of curves – the gull’s wing drawn
from lifting shoulder to the tapered tip
trailing its final feather into air. A line
lovelier, perhaps, than that sharp edge

of rock plunging to ocean. How to end
this? There will be the narrow plot,
the dug rectangle. Until then
there will be seagulls wheeling over headland.
_________________
---------------------

Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com

[[星子安娜]]

Rectangularization of the morbidity curve

The demographer’s desired geometry:
a hale old age and then a rapid fall –
a sudden tumble down a slope of scree
to that inevitable, oblong box.

And we agree.
“Oh, that’s the way I want to go.”
The unexpected failure of an artery
from which we never waken. We dread

the lingering morbidities ahead,
slow occlusions of cognition, bodies
angled into immobility, diapered,
and life a sad, sagged line, tethered

to an all-too-distant other end.
But then I think of you. You said it too:
“Just put me on an ice floe, send
me off. I won’t want to live.”

And yet you did. At no point on that curve
of long diminishment
were you prepared to leave,
to face the cliff. You wanted life until its end.

Then I think of curves – the gull’s wing drawn
from lifting shoulder to the tapered tip
trailing its final feather into air. A line
lovelier, perhaps, than that sharp edge

of rock plunging to ocean. How to end
this? There will be the narrow plot,
the dug rectangle. Until then
there will be seagulls wheeling over headland.
_________________
---------------------

Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com

[anna]

Due to a lot to cover, we will not discuss this poem at the event.
_________________
---------------------

Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com

[[星子安娜]]

Due to a lot to cover, we will not discuss this poem at the event.
_________________
---------------------

Anna Yin

《爱的灯塔-星子安娜双语诗选》
<Nightlights> <Seven Nights with the Chinese Zodiac> ...

http://annapoetry.com