Poem fractal

Mujer

by William Carlos Williams

17 September 1883 to 4 March 1963 (~80)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“I must express myself, but always completely incomplete.”

Expression is never finished; imperfection is inherent · Letter to Harriet Monroe, 14 October 1913

More remarks (24)

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. Robert Herrick · 0.1285 − 1.0203i · 0.035 away · Compare side by side
  2. Emily Dickinson · 0.0982 − 1.0327i · 0.037 away · Compare side by side
  3. Joseph Campbell · 0.0885 − 1.0576i · 0.038 away · Compare side by side
  4. Emily Dickinson · 0.0976 − 1.0819i · 0.039 away · Compare side by side
  5. Hart Crane · 0.0669 − 1.0580i · 0.060 away · Compare side by side
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