American Scientist

To the Editors:

I particularly enjoyed the thoughtful and thought-provoking special issue (July–August). Here is my response:

Inside Your Creative Mind

Try reading any word to the left or right of your thumb.
Or read the gathered dream accounts of friends.
Now, show how the brain’s vasculature is plumbed
Or the serendipitous fusion of colleagues seek several ends.

Incentivize learners to practice music and stay in school
Or find out if creative people are simply smart.
Now seek figures that show us how to find the hidden truth
Or teasing out the painful learnings using art.

By using signs to testify how planets move,
Or breathing out to make the mirrors dance along,
I can flush my brain with dopamine and spring to love
In just the way neurons think in dancing to song.

Come, run through my microscope.
We can gather what our hearts and minds hope.

Robert C. A. Moore
Portland, OR

To the Editors:

Henry Petroski’s article “The Sonnet as Science” (July–August) illustrates the varied talents of engineers and scientists. I have a doctorate in engineering mechanics, and have had a great career as a practicing engineer and as a college professor. I also write poetry and limericks, including this limerick that applies to our field:

There once was a lady that went zip
On the side of a Möbius strip.
One long trip around
Was enough to confound
Her right with her left finger tip.

William Bagaria
Bowie, MD