Poem fractal

Psyche

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

21 October 1772 to 25 July 1834 (~62)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“The man of science seeks truth as a remote and unknown benefactor; he cherishes and loves it in his solitude.”

Portraying the pursuit of truth as a form of devotion · The Friend

More remarks (70)

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 · −0.4952 + 0.2224i · 0.024 away · Compare side by side
  2. D. H. Lawrence · −0.4704 + 0.1847i · 0.031 away · Compare side by side
  3. Dylan Thomas · −0.4385 + 0.2195i · 0.034 away · Compare side by side
  4. Banjo Paterson · −0.5133 + 0.2137i · 0.041 away · Compare side by side
  5. Algernon Charles Swinburne · −0.4859 + 0.2595i · 0.046 away · Compare side by side
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