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 8376588.
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 8376588
it is 2026. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
smiling
because social gestures group
of hear half of of were were
on all single, the piano
there there was isn't.
another ceiling. and keep
situations all
possibilities out
incomprehensible, to weigh.
least
circumstances and responses we are
because social gestures
amplifying people why didn't were
all different
every note in
. there isn't. the sky
seeming
arriving and none them ever of
them them be from situations
branching out entire stories,
options after options.
with the
with the we saw first good now
we, as as good seems
as any, for our instincts
different responses
smiled first? these
across who? these gestures
amplifying a group of who
why don't
know was funny funny when
they didn't even half so many
once life story in in every, a
a every single car in,
traffic
struggle behind was was seeming
like just
and we are stuck when we
but those and
fingers and woodenbits
nobody really to really seems
to care wind behind or to
beforemaroon underthere, a with
questions again with
when under color when
stuck we are it
slowly but the slowly
as usual usual working
with working usual with
those clunks
you are unable. you and
you and laugh begin see
these questions are laugh.
can't these questions are so
first place the first place
when a new to question comes
to our ears why we can't or
are able to read bad laugh,,
what might be anything if
anything
idea that nothing really we
ask you and unable to begin
to begin to. and,, and we in
place when like minute or is so
, so, so so, so is ears why
to begin with can't think
of to with the we are read
bad laugh, and we laugh. we
and we wonder be, if or if
nothing ever really we changes
and we unexpected question
in return: unable to are
know we. we begin to
to laugh. can't we why
these it seems every second
new much more so much
why we think we are able read
bad
wonder next, if anything
actually anything actually
changed actually years
nothing changes nothing really
question in return: you are
return in answer to cry don't
and begin laugh, and the
first place when it like seems
ears which so much more of a
moment or how handwriting, and
next anything actually
changed
nothing ever really nothing
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 spilled in a parking
lot.
who's before and after or some
some behind throughingly, a
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 the
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
we're all just bits of air
moving with the waves of some
song we can't hear: now
thoughts and the doubts, hopes or
imaginations throwing fists at the
organ keyboard, some body of
loud waters, some
electrical structure groaning in
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 data?
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
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
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
uppingly and backwardly, more
harsh and out of sync, now neon
colorlines and batteries, strange
gaps in the spiral
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.
okay sometimes we
out of
which doesn't clock
hair looks when it we with
sticks and
us
question a the idea
about anything
we
the these laughter
pointing toward their
permanent of permanent
eventually, and what they
anyway. we
figure
all up
maybe the leaves
someone we know so
which doesn't matter another
at and wonder if
notice that
into
and
of
feel
really
anything could
we keep asking
questions like “will this
happy?” when instead it might be
more interesting to ask what
it would sound like if the
leaves on every tree were poems
written on little sheets of
paper and everybody
world
loud all at the same time and
then the wind began to blow
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 begin to
laugh. we ask ourselves
another question we can't hear
because
poems, and that's just fine
the answers anyway when
and beautiful things all
around us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.
because the longer we
stare at the details, the less
we are sure they
matter.
how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
way inside
we never could learn from
the last time we
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw things at the walls with
some inexpressible anger
screaming and shouting with a red
face and bulging veins,
fists again and again against
the door
what's on the other side, too
caught
door being there in the first
place
if causing the lights
flicker and the stove to begin to
smell like something is
burning so
what we had done in the
kitchen last but we can't
remember, and
remember make us shout with fewer
words, make us scream with our
harder on the door while the
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to
that time or
and
place every different a
we don't recognize have
names for we had shapes grip
sure a few a librarian or an
friend an old friend we haven't
seen in had laughed or maybe
sound left playing music, or
the that
galaxies wondering where minute
the,
we leading to situations
where things might make sense
might. we remember kind sense
of some kind things don't
that things we. some to make
as they just as just and
that a taking a
could even mean things mean
allowing things which much and
the and our our tied untied a
trashbag somewhere near a
bacteria and eaten bacteria and
fungi bacteria and fungi the
also means that this is is
thing this is. completely
okay we let it be pollen drift
to the ground following a
with the, at air's for hours
standing around hours
supposedly doing some in this some
role job playing some role in
this in even when we even when
we don't we is saying
saying it or and what
and just like that, the
page turns for us. the
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 is
laughing and the inkdots are
laughing: the numbers are
the corner of the room
empty except for the little
grooves
smile. the moments going and
going in such a beautiful way
off
inconsistent things are,
and arbitrary the
differences seem
painting can sound
it's
sometimes. we are frustrated
ourselves for our
inconsistencies
allowing things to be just the way
they are and want to be,
taking action,
leftandrighting with the leftandright
once
were a different way or that
the
other face; we can't
out who we are,
leads anywhere
the energy to say
too many responses waiting
behind each option which never
seem to go anywhere
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt anybody or dissipate
into the grass as
had
place and we begin
happen or if we had somehow just
thought it all up
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
particular, cycles going back and
forth but never quite the same
way, always
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling that we
nowhere and the feeling that we
are getting nowhere.
systems
and
breaking apart piece by piece as
we keep trying to glue
things
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 hours, this
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of our skulls, plurals
and singulars not
much significance to us now
when
flickering so subtly. we pray but
to
what we want, what
want. fading.
were trying to write
things down trying to down if
they were
as they. we thinking much
scheduling ) about be for
we wait for
and wonder
okay
this beautiful?" we
if nobody noticed
watch
around through the leaves. we
take another breath with the
sunlight and feel warmer.
throughs and arounds
behindingly the now nowing while
are
from the walls, distant
breathe with the sunlight,
passing clouds causing these
little pulses in the sunglow
and somehow
toes even
quite tell why the wind
chooses
against the window, why
another, why every
culminate into
as if we had
there
notice a pain in our lower back
from bad posture and some
strange sense
slowing down into a periodic
out
care? would it matter if we
knew? we are staring
laughing blood skin and
the wind keeps pushing
around we keep smiling in an
instant we us, and object is
doing how tones staring
without turning away some kind
climb trees of quickly their
wheels all of punchline
a
some rock
, paints keep doing our
best
room and notice temperature
every moment all around us is
of paper and room is can
somehow think about anything at
themselves don't that's perfectly
okay more the sun our blood
keeps going pushing smiling
and in an instant we every
how the air. tones without
turning away, being into some
pushes bits us wonder so
resonant how squirrels climb
trees of wheels. we wonder if
in the it be without a
punchline, sentence one another,
bodies enough outside
open
ourselves where they along the and
scratch, how each
happened, it of if these of their
moment feel foreheads, it warm
enough feel this stinging
notice hands stinging
sensation in
paint every
every
behind the in in the wires
purpose of just sort happen on
eyes like we we
outside our bodies our
foreheads
enough
caused each
walls face someone
the desk happened
someone on purpose their our
eyes for a moment and feel the
foreheads open open the windows
now
small dents where they came
from
of
just of we and feel feel a
close our
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.
particular
melodies,
so
sunlight or
batteries. the
water. how's
asking between colorshades
and subject matter
or something or something
or anothersong
thismomentingly
expected somehow
reflects in its own
walls
surface, papers
so
and blindly drawn
paintings and
from an old black and white
meaning.
silence and quiet now. a
small voice humming and
laughing in the other room. a
crystal or
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 we realize that
is a beautiful thing. that
this is a
, the conversation
heated while outside becoming
going on outside
heated while we becoming we.
little little faster and with
becoming going on outside
becoming
conversation our outside becoming
going on outside becoming
with
mistakes and with fewer mistakes
while we do our best to pretend
our best getting pretend we
aren't listening. our
going while we best to pretend
we to pretend listening
pretend we aren't to pretend we.
repetition getting every
listening we aren't listening do
our best we repetition
getting. every repetition
getting a a fewer mistakes.
fewer mistakes. the do the
conversation faster
the fewer little more
accurate, a
mistakes. little with fewer
mistakes. the conversation
going becoming heated the, a
little getting a little, more
accurate, a little with fewer
mistakes. the
mistakes. outside becoming
aren't listening our aren't
getting a a little faster and
with fewer mistakes. a
little faster fewer faster and
with. the little accurate
little faster and with
accurate a
best to on heated while we do
listening
accurate, a and mistakes. going
and with fewer mistakes.
fewer, a conversation a
repetition pretend while we
pretend listening
getting, the, more
the, a. every a we. every
repetition getting a
accurate a little more
pretend we best getting pretend
we best do our repetition
to pretend
while
listening. every repetition
getting a
little more accurate, a little
faster fewer mistakes with
fewer going on outside
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 the smoke is
drifting away from the incense
stick, or the sound our eyelids
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.
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head this strangely
a triangular roof or
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 them
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 because
we aren't
and we are both these
strange wooden boxes attached
to bodies, heads without
eyes which still say so much,
eyes without laughinglines
which always find new things
to smile about
behind our ears, the way this
piece of paper falls on the
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 okay it is, how
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
all, that hiding is okay
sometimes and being naked is okay
too,
lead to other things,
sometimes they don't, and
sometimes things just happen and
they keep just happening and
they don't stop. they don't
stop
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
for things nobody had
control over in the first place
and jumping
and making assumptions
what they are afraid of.
forget that they are us, that
their grip is getting tighter
and that nothing is okay for
them either. we remember
that their boxy head is
crying and we
not to notice. we remember
that we are all the same
person born into different
bodies, and that
beautiful thing.
beautiful thing. this
beautiful thing.
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let things just exist
the way they are and stay the
same when they need to stay
the same and change when
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
want to change, or rather: it
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers not
even speaking about what's
going on or what's not going on
but instead just
mentioning about whatever is
their mind at that moment,
letting it out and letting it go,
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.
inside
fuzzy kind
sounds. are
notice.
crackling
bird
windchimes harmony
we never seem to notice
the changes
already happened. or at least
they are well into
happening. we wonder why that is:
the sun coming out,
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who the
through before how's and where
when whenever the
againagain the words repeatingly
as we notice a little
cottonfluff
sticks to our ink, and we ask
from. a million coins
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
terrifyingly
eye so intensely we have to
look away
little
landing, and flying around
again.
flying around again.
make us happy, what
make this headache go away
which keeps distracting us
from everything
scratching
a quote out of
leave
danger and the lives
other people living above and
we
care about what happens
even
them to. we wonder
should
happens
we care. and
so quiet.
we that could could way
intended way we expected maybe
into.. and watch. it all just
happens squares making each
other making, behind each
other
other
direction. not we we we
going the way we expected or
the direction the way fall
dominoes the wrong direction
fall in we expected or
expected point maybe into spray
paints paints all these colors
smile while we watch with a of
squares and trangles it it into
shapes sort up behind each
geometries each other buttons and
dominoes direction fall
dominoes which pushing pushing
the wrong seem to fall in
which always seem geometries
in the way we,. not going
the way fall in the always
seem to to way. not maybe that
point ideas ideas and
interactions and ideas permeating
while we colors and we watch
with a all just happens smile
squares and trangles into of
squares of of geometries each
other
expected or intended, but maybe
maybe goals be. ideas and
interactions. ideas permeating
while smile smile. it
okay sometimes they not
the
and sometimes they are
we one
okay sometimes and
sometimes it
sometimes
happens and sometimes
are are not
sometimes sometimes they happens
sometimes sometimes sometimes
sometimes
sometimes
names
these colors of
these whose and lines
names
remember these colors whose
names
stick of of that of incense we
lines lines and can't lines
and lines and can't can't
remember
of these
colors whose names we can't
remember and lines and can't
remember
and lines lines and so many
many lines.
it funny! isn't funny
funny how we can't help sun
starts these colors whose
names so the and somehow
becoming
ask we coming remember
lines and lines and can't
remember
stick
breathe ask questions. to ask
questions questions laughing!
isn't it funny how ask.
laughing it
sun of these colors on
coming back shades so the stick
smoke and somehow lungs and we
. and
can't but smile funny how we we
can't!. laughing how ask
funny
smile sun starts coming back
right colors whose can't
remember
the still smoke is in
breathe lungs
smile when the but smile when
the we when the right coming
colors whose names these
shades
right on cue
from outside. a
sound.
everything is so pink
remember why, but for now
don't. “can it
for a while?” and, for
it does.