Poem fractal
0.025 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.
−0.3569 − 0.8058i
Drawing the boundary…
by Jessie Pope
−0.3536 − 0.7807i
Drawing the boundary…
Each poem scrolls on its own, so the two texts stay beside each other.
The rose did caper on her cheek,
Her bodice rose and fell,
Her pretty speech, like drunken men,
Did stagger pitiful.
Her fingers fumbled at her work, —
Her needle would not go;
What ailed so smart a little maid
It puzzled me to know,
Till opposite I spied a cheek
That bore another rose;
Just opposite, another speech
That like the drunkard goes;
A vest that, like the bodice, danced
To the immortal tune, —
Till those two troubled little clocks
Ticked softly into one.
by Jessie Pope
Who's for the trench—
Are you, my laddie
Who'll follow French—
Will you, my laddie
Who's fretting to begin,
Who's going out to win
And who wants to save his skin—
Do you, my laddie
Who's for the khaki suit—
Are you, my laddie
Who longs to charge and shoot—
Do you, my laddie
Who's keen on getting fit,
Who means to show his grit,
And who'd rather wait a bit—
Would you, my laddie
Who'll earn the Empire's thanks—
Will you, my laddie
Who'll swell the victor's ranks—
Will you, my laddie
When that procession comes,
Banners and rolling drums—
Who'll stand and bite his thumbs—
Will you, my laddie
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.
Install V2Melody
Add a home-screen icon for quicker listening in a simple app window.