Poem fractal

The Lover

by Walter Savage Landor

30 January 1775 to 17 September 1864 (~89)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“We enter our studies, and enjoy a society which we alone can bring together. We raise no jealousy by conversing with one in preference to another; we give no offence to the most illustrious by questioning him as long as we will, and leaving him as abruptly.”

The solitary but rich society of books · Conversation / essay (as commonly attributed)

More remarks (112)

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. Dylan Thomas · −0.1958 − 0.4323i · 0.024 away · Compare side by side
  2. Richard · −0.2265 − 0.4387i · 0.025 away · Compare side by side
  3. William Cullen Bryant · −0.1855 − 0.4221i · 0.029 away · Compare side by side
  4. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow · −0.2413 − 0.3947i · 0.035 away · Compare side by side
  5. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. · −0.2189 − 0.4548i · 0.038 away · Compare side by side
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