Poem fractal

If I have suffered pain

by Charles Sorley

19 May 1895 to 13 October 1915 (~20)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“The war is a great thing, but it is not the greatest thing.”

Placing war in perspective without denying its immense power and cost · Letter, 1915

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. Emily Dickinson · 0.1946 − 0.8184i · 0.013 away · Compare side by side
  2. Thomas Parnell · 0.1862 − 0.8153i · 0.020 away · Compare side by side
  3. Ernest Dowson · 0.2107 − 0.7713i · 0.041 away · Compare side by side
  4. Edward Lear · 0.2458 − 0.7997i · 0.042 away · Compare side by side
  5. Emily Dickinson · 0.1653 − 0.8366i · 0.047 away · Compare side by side
—
—
0:00
0:00
Track 1
Skip to main content