Poem fractal

When youthful faith hath fled

by John Gibson Lockhart

12 June 1794 to 25 November 1854 (~60)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“It is an old belief that on some solemn shore beyond the sphere of grief dear friends shall meet once more.”

Consoling hope of reunion beyond death · Letter to Thomas Carlyle, 1842

More remarks (1)

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. Algernon Charles Swinburne · 0.0014 − 1.0925i · 0.032 away · Compare side by side
  2. Christina Rossetti · 0.0092 − 1.0994i · 0.042 away · Compare side by side
  3. Thomas Hardy · −0.0371 − 1.0278i · 0.043 away · Compare side by side
  4. Emily Dickinson · −0.0315 − 1.0244i · 0.044 away · Compare side by side
  5. Mina Loy · −0.0627 − 1.0757i · 0.048 away · Compare side by side
—
—
0:00
0:00
Track 1
Skip to main content