Poem fractal

Hatred

by Gwendolyn B. Bennett

8 July 1902 to 30 May 1981 (~79)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“You were always glad to see them. You always had an exciting time when you were with them.”

Remembering the companionship and creative excitement of Harlem's artistic circles · Interview with Sandra Govan, 1979

More remarks (8)

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. Hart Crane · 0.0698 − 0.0327i · 0.018 away · Compare side by side
  2. John Donne · 0.0698 − 0.0335i · 0.018 away · Compare side by side
  3. Cale Young Rice · 0.1045 − 0.0226i · 0.023 away · Compare side by side
  4. Thomas Traherne · 0.0741 − 0.0427i · 0.024 away · Compare side by side
  5. Lady Jane Wilde · 0.0589 + 0.0118i · 0.039 away · Compare side by side
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