Poem fractal

Estrangement

by William Watson

2 August 1858 to 11 August 1935 (~77)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“We cannot believe that he criticiseth best who loveth best all styles both great and small.”

Against indiscriminate appreciation as the mark of the best critic · Essay, Excursions in Criticism

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. Henry David Thoreau · −0.0074 + 0.0891i · 0.017 away · Compare side by side
  2. G. K. Chesterton · −0.0103 + 0.0877i · 0.019 away · Compare side by side
  3. Joaquin Miller · −0.0085 + 0.0547i · 0.032 away · Compare side by side
  4. Edwin Markham · −0.0150 + 0.1096i · 0.036 away · Compare side by side
  5. A. A. Milne · −0.0370 + 0.0730i · 0.046 away · Compare side by side
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