Poem fractal

To the Shade of Burns

by Charlotte Smith

4 May 1749 to 28 October 1806 (~57)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“The public has been so indulgent to the former editions of these poems.”

Acknowledging the unusual generosity of her readers · Preface to Elegiac Sonnets

More remarks (4)

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 · −0.1114 + 0.5648i · 0.009 away · Compare side by side
  2. Rudyard Kipling · −0.0985 + 0.5931i · 0.022 away · Compare side by side
  3. Ella Wheeler Wilcox · −0.1270 + 0.5944i · 0.028 away · Compare side by side
  4. Oscar Wilde · −0.1075 + 0.5427i · 0.031 away · Compare side by side
  5. Alfred Austin · −0.1257 + 0.5476i · 0.031 away · Compare side by side
—
—
0:00
0:00
Track 1
Skip to main content