Poem fractal
0.109 apart. A smaller distance means the lines are built more alike.
This number is read from the build of the lines. The bright edge is that number, carried outward until the pattern repeats.
by Paul Valéry
0.8098 − 0.6856i
Drawing the boundary…
by Allan Ramsay
0.7049 − 0.6564i
Drawing the boundary…
Each poem scrolls on its own, so the two texts stay beside each other.
by Paul Valéry
Quelle, et si fine, et si mortelle,
Que soit ta pointe, blonde abeille,
Je n'ai, sur ma tendre corbeille,
Jeté qu'un songe de dentelle.
Pique du sein la gourde belle,
Sur qui l'Amour meurt ou sommeille,
Qu'un peu de moi-même vermeille
Vienne à la chair ronde et rebelle!
J'ai grand besoin d'un prompt tourment:
Un mal vif et bien terminé
Vaut mieux qu'un supplice dormant!
Soit donc mon sens illuminé
Par cette infime alerte d'or
Sans qui l'Amour meurt ou s'endort!
by Allan Ramsay
Now the sun’s gane out o’ sight,
Beet the ingle, an’ snuff the light;
In glens the fairies skip an’ dance,
An’ witches wallop o’er to France.
Up in the air
On my bonny grey mare;
An’ I see her yet, an’ I see her yet.
Up in the air
On my bonny grey mare.
The wind’s drifting hail an’ snaw
O’er frozen hags like a foot ba’;
Nae starns keek thro’ the azure slit,
It’s cauld an’ mirk as ony pit.
The man i’ the moon
Is carousing aboon,
D’ye see, d’ye see, d’ye see him yet.
The man i’ the moon
Is carousing aboon.
Tak your glass to clear your een,
It’s the elixir hales the spleen,
Baith wit an’ mirth it will inspire,
An’ gently puffs the lover’s fire.
Up in the air,
It drives away care;
Hae wi’ ye, hae wi’ ye, an’ hae wi’ ye lads, yet.
Up in the air,
It drives away care.
Steek the doors, keep out the frost;
Come, Willie, gie’s about your toast;
Till’t lads, an’ lilt it out,
An’ let us hae a blythesome bout.
Up wi’t there, there,
Dinna cheat, but drink fair,
Huzza, huzza, an’ huzza, lads, yet.
Up wi’t there, there,
Dinna cheat, but drink fair.
A fractal is a shape that keeps its pattern when you look closer. Coastlines, trees, shells, and weather do this. The large form and the small form are the same kind of thing. A poem can be drawn that way. The shape of the whole comes from the shape of the lines.
Primunia is the name for the source of that order: the pattern under the pattern, already there in a tree, a shell, and a verse.
The number under the picture is the poem constant. It is read from the build of the lines: their length, how uneven they are, the size of the stanzas, the share of vowels, and the way the lines end. A new word moves the number when it changes that build. The same poem always gives the same number.
Drawn on its own, that number sits in a quiet part of the plane, and most poems would look like the same soft disk. So the number is carried outward along its own direction until it meets the edge of the Mandelbrot set, where the shape turns sharp. The picture is the Julia set of that meeting place.
Each point on the canvas is folded again and again by one small rule. Points that stay near the rule form the dark interior. Points that rush away become the coloured bands. The hue comes from the poem constant, and the brightest bands turn toward gold. Change the length of a line, the stanza, or the vowel share, and both the number and the picture move.
Branching draws the poem as a tree. Each turn follows a line, and every smaller branch repeats that pattern. A longer line reaches farther. The letters at the start of a line bend the next turn. A higher share of vowels opens the branches wider.
The trunk takes its colour from the poem constant and warms toward gold at the tips. When the poem has more than one stanza, gold forks leave the trunk. Each fork is a stanza beyond the first, up to three. The tree divides where the poem divides. One stanza remains a single trunk.
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