Tatiana Bonch-Osmolovskaya
In these visual poems, 'Dreaming (almost Heinrich Heine)', 'Tetrahedron of forking paths' and 'Squaring the sphere' I explore geometrical shapes through poetry. An infinite chain of reflections: night and day, dream and reality, heat and coldness, north and south are presented on the Mebious band as two parts of the same image referring to the famous Heine poem; moving along a side of a tetrahedron with a line of a poem, the reader comes to a choice of turning left or right for the next side and the next line, the path continues till the next vortex, and never ends; segmentation of the spherical surface and shifts by one cell for a letter allow me to fulfill an operation of squaring the sphere. Mathematics and poetry are inseparable here, as the poetical intention defines a choice for the form, and geometrical forms define poetical messages, all together, by sphere, regular polyhedron and one-side band making a minimum encyclopedia of formal poetry.
...If you turn left you will lose your head
If you turn right your horse will fall dead
If you turn left you’ll get a herd instead
If you turn right you will be nicely fed
If you turn left you will rise from dead
If you turn right all your blood will be shed
If you turn left you will become blind
If you turn right you‘ll be the first among mankind
If you turn left you’ll get into a hive
If you turn right you will largely thrive
If you turn left you will wear red
If you turn right will eat led bread
If you turn left you will eat white bread
If you turn right you’ll get back your head
If you turn left you’ll live a king’s life
If you turn right you’ll get the cutest wife
If you turn left your horse will be alive
If you turn right you will die in strife
If you turn left you will lose your mind
If you turn right you will be left behind
If you turn left you’ll be completely mad
If you turn right your mum will be so glad...
S Q U A R E S Q U A R E
Q U A R E S Q U A R Q U
U A R E S Q U A R Q U A
A R E S Q U A R E S Q U
R E S Q U A R E S Q U A
E S Q U A R E S Q U A R
S Q U A R E S Q U A R E
Q U A R E S Q U A R Q U
U A R E S Q U A R Q U A
A R E S Q U A R E S Q U
R E S Q U A R E S Q U A
E S Q U A R E S Q U A R
...On a tropical far southern land
In the middle of desert red sand
Stands a palm tree. Alone in despair
Under the brightest blue sky and thick air
Under the moon and the Southern Cross stars,
She is trembling, her leaves like old scars
Under the hot sandy wind. She is dreaming –
She’s a pine-tree.
As if from the beginning
She is seeing herself
On a far northern land
Among snow and ice she is standing
Over waves, over tide’s never-ending
On a high desert cliff she’s alone
Growing high at the edge of a storm
Over grey windy seas, beneath clouds
Far away from the cities and crowds,
Under bright seven stars of the Great Bear
There’s nobody near her to care.
She’s alone, half-unconscious, losing
Her strong branches by the storm, and musing
As in daydream she sees…