Poem fractal

Death of an Infant

by Lydia Huntley Sigourney

1 September 1791 to 10 June 1865 (~74)

Browse poets 678
In their words

“The Sabbath is the golden clasp that binds together the volume of the week.”

A memorable image of sacred time giving structure and coherence to ordinary life · Prose writing, commonly attributed

More remarks (2)

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. D. H. Lawrence · −0.3355 + 0.7997i · 0.004 away · Compare side by side
  2. John Clare · −0.3183 + 0.8204i · 0.023 away · Compare side by side
  3. John Keats · −0.3506 + 0.7862i · 0.024 away · Compare side by side
  4. Edward Thomas · −0.3452 + 0.8235i · 0.026 away · Compare side by side
  5. Geoffrey Chaucer · −0.3432 + 0.7675i · 0.036 away · Compare side by side
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