Poem fractal

A Hunting Song

by Amelia Alderson Opie

12 November 1769 to 2 December 1853 (~84)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“I am at times very low, but there is safety in lowness for some people, and I am one of them.”

Finding humility and caution within periods of low spirits · Letter to Elizabeth Fry, 6 December 1823

More remarks (40)

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. Isaac Rosenberg · −0.2845 − 0.0702i · 0.007 away · Compare side by side
  2. T. E. Brown · −0.2577 − 0.0859i · 0.025 away · Compare side by side
  3. Edward Thomas · −0.2652 − 0.1008i · 0.032 away · Compare side by side
  4. Hart Crane · −0.2618 − 0.1006i · 0.033 away · Compare side by side
  5. W. H. Davies · −0.3114 − 0.0750i · 0.033 away · Compare side by side
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