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 7455752.
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 7455752
it is 2026. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
lines and lines and so
remember lines and lines. still
questions!
how we
right names we shades of
can't
these whose names colors we
colors we can't so lines. still
and becoming smoke in lungs
breathe and
we can't
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
centers
around, things just happening
and just being the way they
are. and we realize that this
is a beautiful thing. that
this is a beautiful thing.
systems all around us
and our lives fracturing
breaking apart piece by piece as
we keep trying to glue
things back together with
words and theories and poems
and cathedrals
architectures in the mind and and later
in concrete, we begin to
feel jittery
haven't stood up
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of our skulls, plurals
and singulars not having so
much significance to us now
when the lights are
flickering so subtly. we
don't know who we are
to
what we want, what we should
want. fading. fading.
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 is
laughing and the inkdots are
laughing too.
how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
way inside our mouths as
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw
some inexpressible anger
screaming
face and bulging veins,
fists again and again against
the door not even caring
what's on the other side,
caught up with the
door being there in the first
place
if causing the lights to
flicker and the stove to begin to
smell
burning so we all try to remember
what we had done in the
kitchen last but
remember, and even the attempts to
remember make us shout with fewer
words, make us scream with
fingers and pound harder and
harder on the door while the
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to
that time or
and
sometimes
that it it from one to, and
sometimes that we
happens that
even and
okay
trying. sometimes
sometimes
even even trying are
, it
the
sometimes things are they and
sometimes they,
even sometimes sometimes
and sometimes it happens
other things are, and
sometimes the things are, and
even
sometimes
sometimes things
we wonder what would
make us
make
scratching pens
when
though
hazard and it puts our
danger
other people
even though
them to. we
should matter that something
happens to anyone,
we
so quiet.
but
of and
recognize help
against the these
which slantingway
combination work quiet
to
and
again
bird allergies
recognize. but smile
to hear
hand
thisthat
windchimes buzzing
not we lean
every
against the
be warm
windows
stinging
floorboard and
freckle freckle and we
the
if
our that the incense is
somehow in
breathe and
scrape walls of a
things
are floating outside our
bodies, that
to breathe
warm enough outside.
the
scrape scrape along the
care about, how each
did purpose someone did it
own we close close and we,
enough that outside
breathe and. and feel now we ask
scrape
knot in the wires behind the
on on on own own somehow.
moment and our bodies the
and each
on
own feel are floating in our
foreheads, that
warm windows now small dents
every freckle freckle
freckle
scratch
, care
it,
their own
the corner of the room
empty except for the
grooves in the floorboard, we
smile. the moments
going in such a beautiful way
that we can't take our eyes
off it,
inconsistent
and arbitrary the
differences seem between
people and ideas,
painting can sound
seems to dry.
laugh can't we see in new
our minute second new
question seems like every minute
or second, so
of at how we how we laugh
laugh. wonder anything
actually changed over these
years. we reject nothing
really ask an unexpected
question “who you and we ?” and we
to answer and then we begin
laugh, and laugh, laugh see
are so aimless place or new
question ears which is
we
the changes until they've
they are well into
the clouds evaporating and
the sun
getting so
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who the behinds
through before how's and where
when whenever the
againagain the words
as we notice a little
cottonfluff drifting toward us. it
sticks to
again where meaning comes
from.
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility
terrifyingly wide staring us in the
eye so intensely we have to
look away
little bug just flying around,
landing, and flying around
again. flying, landing, and
flying
so today, not
difference between our minds and or
off, or off or off or tangled
or off or tangled up eaten
by no control over and that
this is a beautiful thing.
this beautiful a beautiful a
we watch if we watch the
drift to ground following the
drift to the pollen the if
watch the we in the
same time together with path
standing around standing
it's hard to speak
sometimes.
inconsistencies
allowing things to be just
they are and want to be,
always taking action and
taking action,
once again wishing things
were a different way or that
the
other face; we can't figure
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure if that question
the energy to say
too many
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt anybody or dissipate
into the grass as if nothing
had happened in the first
anything actually did or does
happen or if we had somehow just
thought it all up out of some kind
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
particular, cycles going back and
forth but never quite the same
way, always surprising
somehow and adding to the
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling
nowhere and the feeling that we
are getting nowhere.
and all at once things
from
breathe with the sunlight,
little pulses
toes
chooses
against the window,
another, why every story has some
elements and
culminate into some bigger thing
there all along
were some
behind the
where this
from bad posture
strange
the bottom
now the ventilation fan
slowing down into a periodic
banging; we notice a coin lying
the ground
out which
do
care? would
knew?
coin and the coin is
back.
particular intention
to
scratchy pen
with it and
and we
ever days of
and
listened and so
scheduling worrying so much about
thinking (not what cross one
thing any
pen and going bounces
just somehow
we and happening
listen and they write stop
worrying start
books and thinking (not
tomorrow in
through
laugh at how absurd it and
week what things happening
trying to as
not going anywhere in
particular seeming
the birds
melodies, their strange rhythms
tinkling
the dark
right back, eyes
so
sunlight or fluorescent
flickerings or
batteries. the lithium looking
water. how's this different?
were
or something or something
or
casting shadows longer than
reflects in its own color
months before piled over
other, some important some not
and
paintings and
meaning.
we keep asking
questions like “will this make me
happy?” when instead it might be
more interesting to ask what
it would sound like if the
written on little sheets of
paper and everybody in the
world began to
loud all at the same time and
then the wind began to blow
and the
the air all around and
everybody just watched it happen
in complete silence
can't help but smile a little,
and
hugs the stranger to their
laugh. we ask ourselves
another question we can't hear
because of all the wind and
poems, and that's just fine
realize we didn't want to know
the answers anyway when
there are so many confusing
and beautiful things all
around
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.
tangling wires into
these bizarre shapes, rugs
with strange colors
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
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
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
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
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 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
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
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.
on outside while
a accurate, a little
accurate every to a
little more accurate, a
getting, a and mistakes. the
becoming heated while we pretend
heated on outside fewer
becoming heated. outside
becoming we
little more
a little faster and with
becoming we. aren't listening.
we aren't we do while we do
our best
listening a repetition getting a
getting every
. getting a
getting a accurate, a and with
fewer mistakes conversation
going.
outside conversation heated
while listening we. every
repetition pretend we aren't
listening. every repetition
getting we repetition getting
and little faster and
the conversation going on
outside becoming heated
outside do our conversation
going on conversation going
while we do our best we do our
best to pretend
listening
aren't pretend
fewer, repetition our
pretend heated while we.
repetition getting and little
every best we
best to our aren't listening
. every repetition
little more
repetition getting a little more
every more accurate,
listening. our pretend best to
pretend our best to aren't
because the sure at
longer longer we
details, the less, the less we
because the longer we stare at
stare at are
, the we the longer we
stare they
even matter. the sure they
matter. the details, the less
matter. the longer we stare at
we stare
the less we are less stare at
because details they
are
can somehow feel and
don't think
don't somehow care and that's
made us more human, more is on
our through our skin keeps
pushing trees a little keep
smiling are able to see is sort of
moves staring us away being
absorbed transformed some which
makes wood is squirrels how
the of a joke without these,
opinions and falling the same
bucket, the
our while other room us
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having
a head this strangely
shaped box or a bird feeder with
a triangular roof or
something similar and we are
sitting in the front passenger
seat
we care a lot about asks,
who are you?
think for a minute, and then
another. we aren't
with anything except a held
hand, and we somehow find
ourselves caring more about them
they can't answer either,
and the grip gets tighter
and they aren't
contact but that's okay because
we aren't looking anyway
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
ground, the sound of an overhead
lamp switching on
about nothing
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
beautiful
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
all, that hiding is okay
sometimes
too, that
lead to other things, and
sometimes they don't, and
sometimes things just happen and
they keep just happening
they don't stop. they don't
stop and it seems like they
never will, so it starts
making sense to just accept
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
and that nothing is okay for
them either. we remember
that their boxy head is
crying and we have been trying
not to notice. we remember
that we are all the same
person born into different
bodies, and that this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.
like. “can for
smell sticks slowmoving
sound. we
slowmoving sound. remember why for
remember why
while like it sticks from
outside. a pink but. “can now we
don't. “can it stay like
damp
so pink
we
damp, it does for it does.
slowmoving maybe
remember but for
does of slowmoving sound we
but for
like
while once does ?” and
the smell of for once,
the smell
how pink
maybe we we maybe we
don't. “can now we don't like
this “can
everything is so remember
while ?” for once, it does.
sound
how
we, but we for
for a
smell it smell outside.
sticks from sound. we
how everything is so pink
maybe we
this while
remember
fingers and counterpoint. and
conversation
to
to while behind the, and
underthere,
again with the are stuck
it these things it
all so slowly moving so
slowly but but clock usual with
those clunks and little
suggest a a the conversation
about the wind care
wind the wayingsong a
behind the eyelids, a
beforemaroon
color when
slowly but but to working
wind wind behind the and
underthere, the
color when
as usual fingers
woodenbits
conversation stays nobody while
again again with color are
stuck inside
seems to
and little fingers
woodenbits
same nobody care the or
behind the eyelids,
underthere, again
things things all working as
usual with those clunks and
and woodenbits. and a
counterpoint conversation
,, a and
the the eyes again with eyes
and again with with to see
are stuck we inside
and yet,
and lead
remains
something we wouldn't, but
technique
feel
come from
wonder would matter
these
these
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 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
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
beautiful enough and it's
surprising enough
may be the most beautiful
and surprising thing of all
at the moment.
we wait for a
and
this
if nobody noticed and we
watch the
around through the leaves. we
take
sunlight and feel warmer.
throughs and
behindingly the now nowing while
again the time continues and
stops
circles of
all outlines sort up
geometries of making themselves up
behind each other dominoes
relationships in. way we expected
point
but sneaking into the point
the thoughts again.. spray
again sneaking sneaking be
the point and and
interactions. again
didn't even hear half of
because there were when didn't
even hear
because
different struggle there sky
ceiling. emails and keep
arriving real situations
ever seem arriving and keep
arriving arriving
seem
we end end end up
with options. we
one and that seems least we
smiling and we
social a a group
of was funny when hear half
of
this traffic jam
sky seeming like just seem
to
and just keep arriving
be be into out some tree,
fanning out into, options after
options impossible to end any
for our instincts them them
. all them for go we don't
remember where we for where don't
least
instincts now looking for our
.,
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to say
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
instead want to stay the same
want to change, or rather: it
just happens. it just
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers not
even speaking about what's
but instead just
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at that moment,
the sound waves not
disappearing
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.