The Hum of Geometry; the Music of Spheres, by Alex Stolis

Poetry, chapbook, 24 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

Pythagoras is an ancient Greek philosopher most famously known for the Pythagorean Theorem. He is credited with saying “There is geometry in the humming of the strings. There is music in the spacing of the spheres.”

Galileo, the Italian Renaissance astronomer, physicist, and engineer, is quoted as saying “Mathematics is the language in which God has written the Universe.”

Math, Geometry, Physics, The Sciences are threads that run through our lives and though we cannot comprehend it all, we humans still like to sum things up in neat clean packages. Simple Problems. Simple Answers. We start young; If you eat 2 ice creams, your best friend Billie eats 3 ice creams; how many ice creams total did you eat?

Our need to order things, make sense of things, explain things, causes us to believe we know more than we do; we have answers that aren’t real or true; I love you + You love me = Happily-ever after.

We stumble into and out of relationships, wonder why they didn’t work, or why they did, plunge headlong forward, and just when we think we have the answer, the universe shows us otherwise.

Alex Stolis’ collection of poems, word problems, and answer keys, is an attempt to capture the hum and music that are embedded in our relationships, even if we never discover the real problem or answer.

Alex Stolis lives in Minneapolis; he has had poems published in numerous journals. Two full length collections, Pop. 1280, and John Berryman Died Here were released by Cyberwit and are available on Amazon. His work has previously appeared or is forthcoming in Piker’s Press, Jasper's Folly Poetry Journal, Beatnik Cowboy, One Art Poetry, Black Moon Magazine, and Star 82 Review. His chapbook, Postcards from the Knife-Thrower's Wife, was released by Louisiana Literature Press in 2024. http://www.louisianaliterature.org/2024/04/11/new-release-announcement-alex-stolis/ RIP Winston Smith is forthcoming from Allen Buddha Press. He has been nominated multiple times for the Pushcart Prize.