x
we accidentally imagine
by andrew yoon
this is a book of mutable poetry. it exists along a
field of probability with an effectively endless number
of possible realizations. every time this page is opened,
a program generates an entirely new version of the book.
some elements change more often than others. the random
seed for the version you are looking at is 1303096.
because there is a seed number stored in this window's url,
refreshing this page or opening a link to this url
will render the exact same contents you see now.
if you would like to share or keep a link to this version of the book,
you can use this .
if you want to visit or share a random new version of the book,
use this one .
to link to an exact version of a particular poem,
hover over the poem's title area and click the link
which appears that says "fixed link". you will also
see one that says "mutable link" - this points to where
that particular mutable poem lands in a random new book.
try following the mutable links of a particular poem through
different versions and see how it transforms.
you can print or (if your computer has the ability) download a
print-ready pdf of this version of the book using your browser's
printing functionality. some elements of the display will change
to make it more suitable for printing. (you may want to modify your
printing settings to disable the automatic header/footer generation
most browsers do.) please note that as i make
improvements to the mechanics of the program, the content you see
here will likely change, even with a fixed seed - if you want a
truly fixed version, please use the printing method.
the code for this entire project is under the gpl3 license and is
completely free to read, use, and redistribute. the most up-to-date
code is available on github
here .
andrew is a composer, programmer, poet, and bad pianist. you can
find some of his other projects online at his personal website
here .
...
we accidentally imagine
by andrew yoon
seed 1303096
it is 2025. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
up our a that the sky, a
new piece of a, a sky, sky the
sky of garbage on of
different tones of voice and tones
of voice of voice and
combinations voice combinations of,
we that of to if we prefer to
of it, a again,
smallvoiced reminder
language and there different
language and there we for even we
are feet few shuffling a
librarian a we we don't remember
the phone ventilation or
the ventilation we
remember asking questions
their they are hurtling are
toward will finally for
finally when it will stop
agains the wayingsong a
we or to
beforemaroon, the
questions and ideas
under a color when
inside it
moving so slowly but
seems to be working as usual
with those clunks and little
fingers and woodenbits
conversation stays the same and
nobody really
about the
because
stare
matter.
and just like that, the
page turns for us. the next
series of random numbers fill
the screen and we begin to
imagine dots and we begin to
connect them and agree and
disagree with them, relate to
them and question them and
share them. the page glares.
we glare. everybody is
glaring and nobody is laughing
and then one of us starts
laughing, and another one of us
starts laughing, and we are all
laughing and the paper
laughing and the inkdots are
laughing: the numbers are
laughing too.
.
and again
sound of
this
not
which
sound making
we sound
sound
crackling,
against the
we not
faster and with fewer
heated while the conversation
going on with fewer and with
fewer mistakes. little
faster and with accurate,
little more accurate
getting a little listening.
every repetition getting, a
faster, a fewer mistakes with
fewer mistakes with becoming
we do our pretend we we
going on the conversation
going
do heated best we best to
while we do our best to pretend
listening. every aren't heated
while we do our best to pretend
best listening. we aren't
listening
good as any remember
where
don't different
circumstances, different all these
different circumstances calling
dealing dealing and
know
they when who
, there were so at once, a
different traffic jam every
different struggle struggle
single traffic jam
in the piano
isn't. sky seeming like just
keep arriving keep and
ceiling keep arriving and
arriving and
stories
fanning out
saw go looking for our
instincts
them smiling. we are
smiled
was the joke things going
traffic traffic in every single
car this
there was more isn't. the sky.
emails
keep arriving keep arriving
them be seem real entire,
possibilities fanning
some
we wait for a
and wonder if it would be
this beautiful?"
if nobody noticed
around through the
take another
sunlight and feel
again the time continues and
stops
circles
and all
are so
from the
clanging of
breathe with the sunlight,
little
and somehow we feel it in our
quite tell why
chooses the pitches it sings
against the window,
harmony should point
another, why every story has some
sort of climax
elements and trajectories
culminate into
there all along as if there
were some kind of purpose
behind the penscratches or
fall
notice
from bad posture and some
the bottom of our right foot
now the ventilation fan
slowing down into
banging; we notice a coin lying on
out which side
knew? we are staring at the
coin and the
marbles in
particular seeming
the dark
so
sunlight
batteries. the
water. how's
and
or something or something
or
thismomentingly
reflects in
walls
surface, papers
months before piled over each
other, some important
so
laser jet printer,
meaning.
we keep asking
questions like “will this make me
more
it would sound like if the
leaves on every tree were poems
written on little sheets of
paper and everybody in the
world began to read them out
loud all
and the poems went flying in
the air all around and
everybody just watched it happen
in complete silence
can't help but smile a little,
and then a lot. and someone
hugs the stranger to their
left and we all
laugh. we ask ourselves
because
poems, and that's just fine
realize we didn't want
the answers anyway when
there are so many confusing
and beautiful things all
around us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding to read them and
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.
lines and lines and lines many
incense incense is of incense
in forget to
questions! we it funny questions
laughing it funny
starts coming back
whose names so many
and somehow in our lungs ask
right on cue
colors whose names we
still breathe to ask
questions. we we
how the sun
starts coming right
can't remember
tangling wires into
these bizarre shapes, rugs
with strange colors and
melodies waitingly, taking deep
breaths before the speech where
we finally speak our
minds: "won't everybody
please, please stop this
cruelty? can't we see how
unnecessary it is?"
window creaking under winds,
some oil
lot.
who's before and after or some
some
manual for writers of research
papers about electrical
engineering and game theory,
complex analysis and early
marxist painting; the
walls of this place have
shoulders that are
sagging, somewhere in these
pages an actual answer to a
question that matters. a new pair
of jeans, a holiday
decoration left up for months, a
lightbulb which doesn't fit even
though we could have sworn
size was right at the store.
color combinations making us
feel sick and wonder why we
care about the dissonance,
why we should prefer one to
the other. we conclude that
we're all just bits of air
moving with the waves of some
song we can't hear: now
banging on the wooddrums, the
thoughts
imaginations throwing fists at the
organ keyboard, some
loud waters, some
electrical structure
rains
the breezings, the sine
waves, the eyeballs thrown
left and right or up and down
or is that a sign of
happiness, of
peacefulness? who's to tell what's
harmony and what's dissonance?
who's to tell the words of the
song when each moment's just
a few bits of
see the picture from a
pixel, hard to find the poem
through a word
the arounds and behinds
lost somewhere in the mix,
the breath being exhaled
before we even noticed it was
inside our bodies, each note
rising just a little higher or
just a little more like dirty
wallpaper:
it happened. where the
music got faster. where the
blue became green, where the
light was switched on and the
newer waves began to
interfere with things and distort
the shapes, canceling out
or multiplying or
performing more complicated
operations until the noise is noise
and the signal is noise and
the noise is still noise yet
somehow wider, more sideways
and spinningly and
uppingly and backwardly, more
harsh and out of sync, now neon
colorlines and batteries, strange
gaps in the spiral
patterns but something about
them which makes us feel the
walls are moving further away
and the room is becoming
smaller, that one moment is
another and the second hand is
somehow different this time
around. we cannot help but go to
sleep again, this time with a
strange smile and already
looking forward to coffee. this
time with socks and a thicker
blanket. this time with the
windows open: and in comes the
cooler air.
we never
the changes until they've
already happened. or at least
happening. we wonder
the clouds evaporating and
the sun coming out, the air
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row
different color. who the behinds
through before how's and where
when whenever
cottonfluff drifting
sticks to our ink, and
again where
from. a million coins being
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
terrifyingly wide staring us in the
eye so intensely we have to
little bug just
landing, and flying around
again. flying, landing, and
flying around again.
the corner of the room
empty except for the little
grooves in the floorboard,
smile.
going in such a beautiful way
that we can't take our eyes
off it, noticing just how
and arbitrary the
differences seem between things and
people and ideas, how musical a
painting can
seems
of another when
thing out place any
particular
straight our ear
can't
even think
even
might
, like
is
how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
way inside our mouths as if
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
more unhappy and began to
some inexpressible anger
screaming and shouting with a red
face
fists again and again
the door
what's on the other side, too
caught up with the idea of the
door being there in the first
place
if causing the lights to
flicker and the stove to begin
smell like something is
burning so we all try to remember
what we had done in the
kitchen last but we can't
remember, and even the attempts to
remember make us shout with fewer
fingers and pound harder and
harder on the door while the
wood is splintering
there and the doorframe
that time or this time again
and again and again
it's hard to speak
sometimes. we are frustrated
ourselves for our
inconsistencies
allowing things to be just the way
they are
always taking action and never
taking action,
leftandrighting with
once
were a
the
other face; we can't figure
out
quite sure if that question
leads anywhere
too
behind each option which
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt
into
had happened in the first
place and we begin to wonder if
anything actually
happen or if we had somehow just
thought it all up out of some kind
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
way, always surprising
somehow and
confusion and lack of
place, the
nowhere and the feeling that we
are getting nowhere.
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to say
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let
the way they are and stay the
same when they need to
the same and change
they need to change, or not
even need to stay the same or
need to change but maybe
instead want to stay the same or
just happens. it just
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers not
even speaking about what's
going on or what's not going on
but instead
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at
the sound waves not
disappearing but echoing off a
thousand surfaces and every
blade of grass, split and
muffled and distorted and
echoed until they sound like
dead trees, the sun pushing
the waves around a little
through the screen door, gnats
in the air just sort of
moving around.
all just happens
outlines of squares and sort into
other things,
trangles it it all and
the geometries and
relationships dominoes which fall in
the wrong going expected or
or intended, but maybe
that the thoughts and paints
and interactions.. spray
squares and trangles, shapes
sort behind each other
pushing buttons wrong
direction. not always pushing
buttons and to fall way we
expected or point. goals again.,
all these colors. it all
outlines outlines of
systems
and our lives fracturing
breaking apart piece by piece as
we keep trying to glue
things back
words and theories and poems
and cathedrals
architectures in the mind and and later
in concrete, we begin to
feel jittery as we realize we
haven't stood up in
chair and its arms a little too
narrow,
and singulars not
much significance to us now
when the lights are
flickering so subtly. we pray but
don't know who
to
what we want, what we should
want. fading. fading.
silence and quiet now. a
small voice humming and
laughing in the other room. a
crystal or some melting snow.
behinds toward while again
around where's or why's while
leftandright shrinking silently. a
wooden creak. a scratch. all
centers
around, things just happening
and just being the way they
are. and
is a beautiful thing. that
this is
even trying. things, they
are,
trying not are the other
one happens that
happens we go the
are happens that other
without even sometimes things
even
sometimes it
sometimes they they and sometimes
it happens
sometimes it trying not
trying
they are
happens other without even
trying
we ask ourselves some
question we can't hear, muffled
because our heads are
underwater, this cold sensation
pressing on our foreheads while
we feel our socks becoming
heavy, cottonfibers grabbing
skin and dragging behind our
feet, cold passing between
our toes. maroon painted
walls and a thick sweater,
crinkling plastic bag full of
snacks. we notice it is becoming
later every moment, and that
as soon as we count one
number there is another in
front of that, always room for
another one or zero or eighty
seven or pencilcase
dirtyshoe, these power outlets
rusting over even though we
can't see where the water
could have come from
the carpet telling which
way people walk most
without asking why they walk it
so often when it seems
there are so, so many other
ways to go and that this way
isn't even the easiest or most
efficient or beautiful or
surprising: they are taking the path
because it is the path they take,
and we can't help but
laughalittle at how beautiful that is
not to say that one is better
than another or that anyone
is wrong for going the way
they do or that we think we are
better than going that
particular way to the couch, but
that we know in the end we are
going to go that way too and
that's just fine. it's just as
good an option as any so we
don't see a reason why not
beautiful enough and it's
surprising enough
may be the most beautiful
and surprising thing of all
at the moment.
outside our be warm
enough outside
dents in and ask ourselves
came from where where they
every
in the wires purpose own
foreheads, that it open the
and
notice small in they came
scrape along groove
along the
care
happen on their somehow
are moment close
feel like we the incense our
scrape scrape
paint
lot in the things just
on
floating outside our
for a moment
if not but somehow we that
would or, more like arm our
blood
, are able around what
moves in the eyes turning into
some kind of
squirrels cars turn in the end turn
out be story a to one glue
opinions and, the screams and
keeps ticking notice on
themselves voices we the moment all
the on is a moment anything
at all if things not but
somehow perfectly because
would us human is arm our going
the wind bit, and we an for
what air just sort of moves.
by the floorboards and
bits of dust and of and how
cars
a. another some rock
another, the hugs, the and we
around voices from help notice
all around us, this of whole
we our for think we don't
know we don't care and that's
that more or feel more like
the sun and our skin and the
music just keeps trees around
what air just sort these
tones staring in, and of
kinetic energy pushes makes us
climb. the end it part a
punchline, a story sentence
another some one after facts
falling, screams and fists and
violins
of ink going around hear
other can't help but notice
the temperature every all
the of room glowing and
all
care. perfectly okay
because caring about us more
happy or more human more the
sun arm the just
little bit, we keep instant we
everything person and the air just
in, floorboards and of of
why is trees cars turn their
wheels we end it out to be
punchline sentence rock glue into
the screams and the the
ticking and. circles while we
the can't every of paper can
a anything at. not
somehow we don't care. about
would never more
unable to then we to then
we begin to laugh, in
first place when it place
first place when it seems like
it a, so can't of good
question to begin with at the
moment or how we are bad to we
laugh wonder actually
changes the idea that idea that
nothing and we changes. we
reject we ask an unexpected
question in: “who are: “who
return:
and then we begin to
laugh, laugh and we it seems
like second a comes ears
which second a second a new so
so much to begin with or bad
handwriting laugh, we we laugh. we
changed actually changed
actually these years or if really
changes. we the idea changes
nothing really that nothing
really
and we and to answer. we. and
then then laugh first place
like every minute to
important
moment are laugh, and we
changed over these reject we ?”
and we are. cry, and so are
these questions why so
aimless in the second a new
question comes to our to our so
important why we can't think of a
good question how
handwriting. bad handwriting. we
laugh laugh. we what be next,
if ever if that return in
return “who are you and are
answer. and then begin and
see in so the first place
comes new comes to our to our
our which,, to our more
important
whether we it really be
look at look
and know comes
make
scratching pens
when we go
hazard
danger
other people living above and
below us, and
even though we never
them to. we wonder why it
should matter
we care. and
now we “can this for a
while ?”
notice why
stay while, it does from it
does.
slowmoving we notice maybe
remember don't. “can it we don't
and, for once, and, for from
outside. we
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head this strangely
shaped box or a bird feeder with
a triangular
something similar and we are
sitting in the front passenger
seat of an old car and someone
we care a lot about asks,
who are you?
think for a minute, and then
another. we aren't able to answer
with anything except a held
hand, and we somehow find
ourselves caring more about
just because they asked.
they can't answer either,
and the grip gets tighter
and they aren't making eye
contact but that's okay
we aren't looking anyway
and we are both these
to bodies, heads without
eyes which still say so much,
eyes without laughinglines
to smile about
piece
ground, the sound of an overhead
lamp switching on
about nothing in particular
and everything in
particular, wanting to want
everything and wanting to want
nothing, to feel everything and
to feel nothing, or at
least something
getting tighter and we remember
how
beautiful it is and
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
all, that hiding is okay
sometimes and being naked is okay
too, that sometimes things
lead to other things, and
sometimes they don't, and
sometimes things just happen and
they keep just happening and
they don't stop. they don't
stop and it seems like they
never will, so it starts
making sense to just accept
this and close our eyes and
smile a little but somehow
this feels impossible. we
get frustrated and start to
do things we don't want to
do, blaming other people
for things nobody had
control over in the first place
and jumping to conclusions
and making assumptions
about other people and their
intentions and what they want or
what they are afraid of.
forget that they are us, that
their grip is getting tighter
them either. we remember
that
crying and we have been trying
not to notice. we remember
person born into different
beautiful thing.
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.
we are breathing. and we
are still breathing. one
thought and another passing by
in the street while we ask
ourselves if this is going
anywhere
focusing on something else like
the way
drifting away from the incense
stick, or the sound our
make when we blink. is there a
place for rushing anymore?
the softmurmurs again,
reminding us about our breath: and
a little blue bird lands
on the windowsill. it is
singing.