<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><p style="line-height: 23.799999237060547px;" class=""><font color="#030303" class="">Pi<br class=""><br class=""></font></p><p style="line-height: 23.799999237060547px;" class=""><font color="#030303" class="">The admirable number pi:<br class=""><em class="">three point one four one</em>.<br class="">All the following digits are also initial,<br class=""><em class="">five nine two</em> because it never ends.<br class="">It can’t be comprehended <em class="">six five three five</em> at a glance,<br class=""><em class="">eight nine</em> by calculation,<br class=""><em class="">seven nine</em> or imagination,<br class="">not even <em class="">three two three eight</em> by wit, that is, by comparison<br class=""><em class="">four six</em> to anything else<br class=""><em class="">two six four three</em> in the world.<br class="">The longest snake on earth calls it quits at about forty feet.<br class="">Likewise, snakes of myth and legend, though they may hold out a bit longer.<br class="">The pageant of digits comprising the number pi<br class="">doesn’t stop at the page’s edge.<br class="">It goes on across the table, through the air,<br class="">over a wall, a leaf, a bird’s nest, clouds, straight into the sky,<br class="">through all the bottomless, bloated heavens.<br class="">Oh how brief — a mouse tail, a pigtail — is the tail of a comet!<br class="">How feeble the star’s ray, bent by bumping up against space!<br class="">While here we have <em class="">two three fifteen three hundred nineteen</em><br class=""><em class="">my phone number your shirt size the year<br class="">nineteen hundred and seventy-three the sixth floor<br class="">the number of inhabitants sixty-five cents<br class="">hip measurement two fingers</em> a charade, a code,<br class="">in which we find <em class="">hail to thee, blithe spirit, bird thou never wert</em><br class="">alongside <em class="">ladies and gentlemen, no cause for alarm</em>,<br class="">as well as <em class="">heaven and earth shall pass away</em>,<br class="">but not the number pi, oh no, nothing doing,<br class="">it keeps right on with its rather remarkable <em class="">five</em>,<br class="">its uncommonly fine <em class="">eight</em>,<br class="">its far from final <em class="">seven</em>,<br class="">nudging, always nudging a sluggish eternity<br class="">to continue.</font></p><div class=""><font color="#030303" class=""><br class=""></font></div><div class=""><font color="#030303" class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Wisława Szymborska</font></div></body></html>