Two Poems by Radoslav Rochallyi

linear norm


the roots are always hot


Author’s Note: At first glance, my poetry looks like a visual creation. But this is by no means an asemic writing or Dada. Every comma in my poetry equations makes sense. I try to combine mathematical formulas and equations, which I consider almost perfect, with my thoughts and feelings. In my opinion, art should be a razor blade, which cuts the reader's perception into thousands of pieces. And it should at least take readers out of "Heidegger's daily life" for a while. Before the poetry of equations, I was fascinated by the Golden Section. In the collection of mathematical poetry Golden Divine, I tried to connect poetry with Fi (φ), and thus with the number 1 61 8034 in non-graphic form and with the golden section in its graphic form. I called this poetry "Golden Ratio Poetry".

Equation Poetry uses mathematical language as an organizational principle and at the same time uses mathematical symbols to describe intonation notation (for example, nervous3), or to define various types of specifications that are simpler or more efficient to express in non-text form. We use equations to write formulas that describe the relationship between variables and, as we know, formulas are stable; similar to structural forms in poetry (for example, Haiku has the exact number of syllables). Mathematics can be understood simply as an extension of spoken and written language with very precisely defined vocabulary and grammar in order to describe and explore relationships. I am convinced that the ambition of Equation Poetry should not be to preserve the meaning of the equation, but to preserve the form, formula and symmetry as accurately as possible.


Born in Czechoslovakia in 1980, living in the Czech Republic, RADOSLAV ROCHALLYI has published more than a dozen volumes of poetry, prose, and visual art. His poems have also been published in many magazines and anthologies. Rochallyi is a graduate philosopher, poet, and writer who writes mainly in English, Slovak and German. You can find him on Twitter @ RRochallyi and Facebook @ radoslav.rochallyi