Poem fractal

Rima LIII

by Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer

1836 to 1870 (~34)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“If we are mistaken, we are mistaken together; which, incidentally, for us is equivalent to being right.”

Original: Si nos equivocamos, nos equivocamos los dos; lo cual, dicho sea de paso, para nosotros equivale á acertar. — Shared uncertainty becomes a form of companionship and discovery rather than failure. · Letter I, Cartas literarias a una mujer (Spanish)

More remarks (27)

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. Allan Ramsay · 0.7049 − 0.6564i · 0.060 away · Compare side by side
  2. Paul Valéry · 0.8098 − 0.6856i · 0.073 away · Compare side by side
  3. Robert Herrick · 0.6685 − 0.6899i · 0.109 away · Compare side by side
  4. Arthur Symons · 0.6480 − 0.6528i · 0.114 away · Compare side by side
  5. Richard Aldington · 0.7273 − 0.5211i · 0.116 away · Compare side by side
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