According to still another New

York Times science report,

woman’s not just a pox

made from man’s bone: Xerox

copies of just X genes

were made in all the scenes

required; she’d like to fly

but, grounded without Y,

is left down with the snakes

all coiled; and for high stakes,

the biologists played

with spirals, at first staid;

then progress turned their thoughts

to structures tied in knots,

and mathematicians

gave some eruditions:

it was their sentiment,

the knot space complement

has numbers of Betti,

and physicists (ready)

told how one does science;

to be in compliance,

you have to use some math;

don’t open up the path

leading those with more hearts

than smarts high on the charts

(just fluttering the eyes

could win the Nobel Prize!);

and you will not convince

students with any sense

that effects of your work

are something you can shirk,

if you’re not exalted.

So biologists salted

all their knotted mole-

cules with talk of poly-

nomials. The snakes saw

that it was good. (You draw

your own conclusion.)

(3/87)                                               

[Originally this was typed onto a sheet of paper; the couplets were cut out in strips; the strips were taped together end to end; and the result was twisted into a knot before the two ends were finally taped together to form a closed loop. Feel free to print it out and do this yourself.]

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