Poem fractal

Sonnet en yx

by Stéphane Mallarmé

18 March 1842 to 9 September 1898 (~56)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“Poetry is the expression, through human language restored to its essential rhythm, of the mysterious meaning in the aspects of existence; it gives authenticity to our sojourn and constitutes the sole spiritual task.”

Original: La Poésie est l’expression, par le langage humain ramené à son rythme essentiel, du sens mystérieux des aspects de l’existence: elle doue ainsi d’authenticité notre séjour et constitue la seule tâche spirituelle. — Defines poetry as a rhythmic use of language that reveals the mystery within existence. · Letter to Léo d’Orfer, 27 June 1884 (French)

More remarks (3)

Drawing the boundary…

Read the poem Another poem

A fractal is a shape that keeps its pattern when you look closer. Coastlines, trees, shells, and weather do this. A poem can be drawn the same way.

The poem’s constant is read from the build of its lines: their length, the size of the stanzas, and the share of vowels. Poems whose constants lie closer together are built more alike. The same poem always draws the same picture. Change the length of a line, the stanza, or the vowel share, and both the number and the picture move.

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.

Poems nearby in the constant

A smaller distance means the lines are built more alike.

  1. Christina Rossetti · 0.5225 − 0.1645i · 0.039 away · Compare side by side
  2. Francis Davison · 0.5925 − 0.1687i · 0.056 away · Compare side by side
  3. Douglas Malloch · 0.4865 − 0.1343i · 0.062 away · Compare side by side
  4. Lady Grizel Baillie · 0.4829 − 0.1229i · 0.066 away · Compare side by side
  5. Paul Verlaine · 0.5122 − 0.0787i · 0.067 away · Compare side by side
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