Ted Mathys

Null Set collects the slightly obsessive possibilities that rise when we give them the space—odd jobs, trouble-making, and farm boy rambling, all in dialogue with mathematics, or William Faulkner, or other poets.

From "Hypotenuse":

HYPOTENUSE
I write three, erase it, blow rubber
shavings from the desk. Write its notation,
erase it, blow shavings. Then three 3s

erased, shavings blown, persist
for the nonce, three of nothing, nowhere
attending to discrete objects for counting,

themselves objects at any rate. To kiss,
sleep, and focus we know to close
our eyes, imagine. I do, see nothing.