As rivers seek the sea, Much more deep than they, So my soul seeks thee Far away: As running rivers moan On their course alone So I moan Left alone.
As the delicate rose To the sun's sweet strength Doth herself unclose, Breadth and length: So spreads my heart to thee Unveiled utterly, I to thee Utterly.
As morning dew exhales Sunwards pure and free, So my spirit fails After thee: As dew leaves not a trace On the green earth's face; I, no trace On thy face.
Its goal the river knows, Dewdrops find a way, Sunlight cheers the rose In her day: Shall I, lone sorrow past, Find thee at the last? Sorrow past, Thee at last?
Death, I say, my heart is bowed Unto thine,—O mother! This red gown will make a shroud Good as any other!
(I, that would not wait to wear My own bridal things, In a dress dark as my hair Made my answerings.
I, to-night, that till he came Could not, could not wait, In a gown as bright as flame Held for them the gate.)
Death, I say, my heart is bowed Unto thine,—O mother! This red gown will make a shroud Good as any other!
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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.