Poem fractal

Imagination

by John Davidson

11 April 1857 to 23 March 1909 (~52)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“I never see anyone. I am not like other men. People ought to think of these things.”

Asserting the poet's radical difference from ordinary society · Conversation

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. William Wordsworth · −0.0591 − 0.6992i · 0.008 away · Compare side by side
  2. Thomas Stanley · −0.0296 − 0.7050i · 0.026 away · Compare side by side
  3. Christina Rossetti · −0.0548 − 0.7357i · 0.029 away · Compare side by side
  4. Christina Rossetti · −0.0368 − 0.7290i · 0.029 away · Compare side by side
  5. A. A. Milne · −0.0483 − 0.6737i · 0.034 away · Compare side by side
—
—
0:00
0:00
Track 1
Skip to main content