Poem fractal

The Arch

by William Soutar

28 April 1898 to 15 October 1943 (~45)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“The thought, of course, is but fleeting — for it is folly to brood: and has not one known the joy — which is enough; and are there not many who have never known it?”

Counters regret with gratitude for happiness already experienced · Diary, 1935

More remarks (39)

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. Emily Dickinson · 0.1566 − 0.5671i · 0.010 away · Compare side by side
  2. Alice Meynell · 0.1561 − 0.5372i · 0.020 away · Compare side by side
  3. Georgia Douglas Johnson · 0.1626 − 0.5365i · 0.023 away · Compare side by side
  4. Robert Browning · 0.1676 − 0.5796i · 0.026 away · Compare side by side
  5. Katherine Philips · 0.1408 − 0.5332i · 0.028 away · Compare side by side
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