Poem fractal

Ode IV.1

by Quintus Horatius Flaccus

8 December 65 BC to 27 November 8 BC (~38)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“Once a word has escaped, it can never be recalled.”

Original: Nescit vox missa reverti. — A reminder of the permanent power and consequence of spoken words. · Ars Poetica (Latin)

More remarks (6)

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. Elinor Wylie · 0.8026 − 0.8345i · 0.058 away · Compare side by side
  2. Mina Loy · 0.7405 − 0.7711i · 0.097 away · Compare side by side
  3. Paul Valéry · 0.8098 − 0.6856i · 0.105 away · Compare side by side
  4. Pierre de Ronsard · 0.9399 − 0.8451i · 0.119 away · Compare side by side
  5. Nora Hopper Chesson · 0.9611 − 0.8133i · 0.128 away · Compare side by side
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