Oh the Admiralty loved a mangled tar, With a missing limb or a battle scar; For a whole man sound was a useless sight, But a one‑legged lad was a proper knight.
Heave away, lads, heave away — The maimed sailed on while the fit stayed bay.
A blind commander steered a ship, A one‑armed middy made the trip; And healthy men on half‑pay shore Watched limbless heroes rise once more.
Heave away, lads, heave away — Patrons ruled the waves each day.
So raise a glass to the Navy’s lore, Where losing bits just helped you soar; And whole men sighed in dull despair While Cap'n Lucky hopped to glory fair.
Cloris, it is not in our power To say how long our love will last, It may be we within this hour May lose those joys we now may taste; The blessed that immortal be From change in love are only free.
And though you now immortal seem (Such is the exactness of your frame), Those that your beauty so esteem Will find it cannot last the same; Love from your eyes has stolen my fire, As apt to waste and to expire.
Then since we mortal lovers are, Let's question not how long 'twill last, But while we love let us take care Each minute be with pleasure past; It were a madness to deny To live because we're sure to die.
Fear not, though love and beauty fail, My reason shall my heart direct, Your kindness now will then prevail And passion turn into respect; Cloris, at worst you'll in the end But change your lover for a friend.
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Track 1
How this picture is made
What a fractal is
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.
How the boundary is drawn
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.
What the branching signifies
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.