How to write a sentence that is impossible to parse

I am currently refereeing a paper that has one of the most unparsable sentences I've ever seen. (The paper itself is pretty good, by the way.) This sentence includes a whopping total of ten prepositional phrases, including seven in a row.

Let's count them, shall we: "This is consistent (1) with the relative smoothness (2) of the return times, which are proportional (3) to the averages (4) of a function (5) of a flow (6) over the trajectory arclength (7) between successive crossings (8) through the Poincaré surface (9) of section and (10) to this arclength itself."

Say what?

(Well, in truth, some of the phrases aren't actually doing any harm, but others are making this sentence really hard to read.)


Students: If any of you are reading this, please don't ever write a sentence like that.