Haiku for Pauline, as Pauline

Abstract

Both of our work with Pauline has cut across many elements of her life and practice. We performed with her, managed projects, organized events, engaged in Deep Listening, studied with her, and have been deeply involved in the stewardship of her archival materials. Most importantly she was our friend and mentor as a colleague in her role as a Professor of Practice at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

We wrote the haiku below together as a series of games. The fifteen letters of her name, multiplied by the three lines of the fifteen haiku equals 85 lines, which would be her birthday number this year. Fortuitously, the resulting 255 syllables equals the maximum value representable by an 8-bit byte and is both a sphenic number and a Mersenne Prime. Since Pauline was a supreme punster, it seems only appropriate to note it here. We can almost hear her giggling.