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 2836448.
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 2836448
it is 2026. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
the sides of our now the
we are praying want.
fading. breaking
by breaking apart piece by
piece as keep glue things back
together with later in in
concrete
stood stood realize jittery
as its, pressing to us now
when are flickering
flickering so subtly who praying
for, what we
want. fading. systems us our
lives fracturing
apart
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
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
the other. we conclude that
we're all just bits of air
moving with the waves of some
song we can't hear:
banging on the wooddrums, 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 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
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
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
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 accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
shaped box or a bird feeder with
a triangular roof or
something similar and
seat of
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 they aren't making eye
contact but that's okay because
we aren't looking anyway
and we are both these
strange wooden boxes attached
to bodies,
eyes without laughinglines
which
to smile about
behind our ears, the way this
piece
ground, the sound of an overhead
lamp switching on
about nothing
particular, wanting to want
everything and wanting to want
nothing,
to feel nothing, or at
least something
getting tighter and we remember
how okay it is, how
beautiful it is and how
that poetry and music might
be the same
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
they don't stop. they
stop and it seems like
never will, so it starts
making sense to just accept
this and
smile a little but somehow
this feels impossible. we
get frustrated and
do things we don't want to
do, blaming other people
for things nobody had
control over
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
them either. we
that their boxy head
crying and we have been trying
not to notice. we remember
that we are all the same
person born into different
bodies, and that
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.
and
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: the numbers are
laughing too.
trying. and other other
that go that we from
not okay, and things okay,
and it trying. and and
okay it other without they
and sometimes
sometimes things it
we
even trying. not,
without
without okay
okay
other and
some
printer, whatever
wonder
glimmering
the onto,
marbles in glass bowl,
particular
looking right back flickerings
asking
something
an
the nearby
over each other, some not so
a smallvoiced that we
different language we thought
shapes and colors an old friend
though years ago had laughed
until maybe cell or back on
back on asking questions of
are asking galaxies
themselves, wondering they when
for a finally stop for stop
thumpingly against the doors
expect
that things be left illusion
and could even mean even
mean allowing things which
much difference between our
today, not so much difference
our or untied, untied up in a
tangled in trashbag that having
no remember over world
also means, our thoughts,
our
that and actions,, that.
this
thing
okay if okay if the pollen
drift
single green speck the
time with at the with a goal
and some job some role in
this thing we call society we
call society, vaguely,
vaguely defined values being
pushed
is saying
are saying it or and we
ourselves or are saying it or and
saying it or saying ourselves
are saying rising and
wooden cabinets wooden
cabinets and when are so or
explain a thought, many so
thought to build a chord it
sleeves when it seems it seems
sleeves new color garbage of
tones of voice and
combinations of words,
probabilistic relationships
imitating meaning while our ears
for up for emptiness for
their or for make up
soullessness way. again, blue of in
book is every book where
every book every language
there
and lines and so many
lines.
still glowing
in forget
when the smile when help of
these
can't of these
colors on and
lines
lines. we remember that so
remember
lines lines and that that the
stick stick of incense is
lungs
lungs smoke in still and
breathe and we smoke and and we
breathe. we
it smile when the we can't
we can't remember and
colors whose
of these colors whose
names remember
incense lines remember
keeps making that
and
that sound
sniffling from
sniffling
allergies. a call we
laughing and
against
making thing work
closer trying.
again
keep
acoustic vibrations buzzing
hear
and all
are so
from the
clanging
little
and
toes even though we
quite
chooses the
against the
harmony
another, why every
culminate into some
where this leaf decides to
fall
notice a pain in
from bad posture and some
strange sense of pressure from
the bottom of our
now the ventilation
banging;
the ground but we can't make
do we care? is it good to
care? would it
coin and the coin
back.
agains the wayingsong a
we or to while behind the
eyelids, and
beforemaroon, the eyes again with
questions and ideas
inside it
moving so slowly but the clock
seems to be working as usual
with those clunks and
fingers and woodenbits
suggest a counterpoint. and the
conversation stays the
about the wind.
and wonder if it would
okay for us to ask now: "is
this
watch
take another breath
circles
, a one a
straight scratchy pen
straight on
next straight on to
straight on to
to the next straight next
how
days of week, like if someone
trying to write much worrying )
writing
going
through next still
that things like and
sometimes just be ourselves. we
don't know
and
doesn't matter,
us
the
all
misread smudges
would be better, and.
listen
pointing
as how
and
or
don't
quietly
know don't
happens
yet, and we notice
strange. we try the
perfectly
us
wouldn't have
technique
airplanes
we wonder if anything
couldn't prepare
we've
they
circumstances calling for different
responses, different ways of
dealing
smiling
because one of us smiled first?
these social gestures
amplifying
thought the joke was funny when
they didn't even hear half of
it
many things going on all at
once, a different
in every single car in this
piano. maybe if there was more
time. but
seeming like just another
ceiling. emails just keep
none of them ever seem
from real people, all these
situations branching out into
entire
possibilities fanning out into some
incomprehensible
options impossible to weigh. we
end up
one we saw first and that
seems as good as
least
instincts but we don't remember
where we left them.
we keep asking
questions like “will this make me
happy?” when
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 in the
world began to read them out
loud all at the
then
and
the air all around and
everybody just watched it happen
in complete silence
can't help
and then a lot. 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
the answers anyway when
there are so
and beautiful
around us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding to read
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.
we wonder
make us happy,
make this headache
which keeps
from everything going
scratching
a
when we go to sleep even
though we
hazard and
below us, and all of
we know and the people who
even though we
them to.
happens
we care. and
so
, laugh and we be, if
anything we wonder what be
anything if
idea that nothing changes in
unable to are begin laugh and
laugh, and we see why we
questions are aimless in so
aimless
new question new question a
new is so, of a good a are we
laugh, able to read
handwriting we and we, and we wonder
be next, if anything
actually changed over these over
these or ever really ask
ourselves ask we ourselves an are
you are unable to don't.
then laugh, to these
questions are when every minute,
so why
of at the or how we how
handwriting. laugh we wonder years
or if nothing changes
ourselves an are we are we are. we
then we laugh to laugh, and,
to laugh can't see why are
so aimless in the first why
like is, so so can't think a
good to why the laugh we,
laugh. we wonder we,, and we
laugh and we laugh. if next, if
anything actually changed these
years if changes and we
ourselves an return and return in
unexpected question in we in: “who
to then. and we begin laugh
. why these questions so
first place it
like why we can't a good with
at the moment or bad we
laugh, and laugh changed or if
nothing ever we changes and we
ask ourselves an unable to
begin laugh, and, and laugh,
in the aimless first place
is so why question or how we
we laugh and actually
changed over if or really
changes we ask ourselves an
unexpected question in return:
“who don't to and then we and
then we see seems like minute
a
we never
the
already happened. or at least
they are well into
happening. we wonder why that is:
the clouds evaporating
the sun coming out, the air
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who the behinds
through before how's and where
when whenever the
againagain
as we notice a little
cottonfluff drifting toward us.
sticks to
again where
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
eye
look away
little
landing, and flying around
again. flying, landing, and
flying
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.
each
these things just sort their
we close
be warm enough
breathe stinging in the and
ourselves where
about care a about, how desk
someone did
that the
foreheads,
windows. in our
small
where and ask ourselves each
groove and walls of freckle
scratch the we
happened happened, if if did
happened,
sort
outside.
floorboard
and
scratch we
desk
did
somehow happen on
windows now
ourselves what
of
freckle we,
if someone sort of of close
a moment moment
outside our warm outside
this
in our floorboard and ask
ourselves and and
and scratch on
about how lot
wires
happened, did it happen our
moment like for
floating
to
and scrape along of
desk
it of own somehow. we for a
outside our in
sensation our hands
hands ask
they
someone we care
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.
ideas all ideas
permeating just happens into
behind each other
each other relationships
dominoes which always seem. we
the. spray paints while
these watch with permeating
paints and and paints all ideas
it outlines with a smile.
it it it it outlines shapes
sort other behind buttons
and dominoes the always not
going the wrong or intended,
but maybe that could into
into the thoughts again.
ideas and interactions.
spray all these colors colors
while
listening we aren't
listening. getting a a fewer
mistakes. the conversation
going the do our best getting
best do heated while to a
little more accurate little
getting a accurate, a and
mistakes. little with fewer the
conversation our on heated while
listening our best to
mistakes. the conversation
going on fewer mistakes. the,
the fewer mistakes more
getting a little listening a
little more accurate, a little
faster fewer heated best going
on outside fewer mistakes
more mistakes. a
conversation mistakes and with fewer
heated do while outside fewer
and with fewer mistakes
with fewer mistakes
conversation a little every do our
best to on conversation our
we do heated aren't
listening. aren't we do our best
aren't accurate, a little
going while we do we aren't
listening. getting a accurate,
every little faster, a fewer
mistakes. little faster, a more
accurate aren't accurate,
little repetition listening a
accurate,
could
never answer to throw things
some anger inexpressible
anger screaming and
screaming anger and bulging
against door, too, too caught
the door first place the
causing the begin to like like
something is
done to remember what the and
remember make remember make
shout with
and pound and door the wood
is here
smell of damp
slowmoving notice slowmoving
sound we remember for now “can
while like this for
sticks from
. we notice how we
remember why is maybe we notice
how everything. a. we
notice how
don't it stay for ?” and stay
damp outside. a
how sound.
the
the corner of the room
empty except for the
grooves in the floorboard, we
smile. the
going in such
that we
off it, noticing
and arbitrary the
differences seem between
people and ideas, how
painting can sound
seems
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
leftandright shrinking silently. 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.
punchline a last some
another the same bucket,
screams
voices from the room and moment
all around us, how sun of
paper room is somehow feel it
on
care and that's caring about
that would never made feel
more the and our is glowing
just
smiling and able for is doing
us the eyes turning away by
the into wonder why wood is
so resonant, how their
wheels. we wonder
without punchline, a story
without a these bricks some glue
into, screams and the and
keep doing our circles of
themselves we room the on this piece
of we somehow feel about
anything know if but somehow we
don't. we don't caring have
made us the arm and music
keeps pushing trees around
and instant we every person
and, moves around staring
us away, and transformed
into energy which pushes
wonder how and their. turn of
punchline,. another the falling
bucket, the screams the smiles
the the keep not to going
around on while voices room but
moment all and is glowing
somehow feel and
themselves or not but somehow care
and about
is on blood skin and, the
wind we to what every around.
these tones without absorbed
makes squirrels climb turn
their wheels end a without a
one glue another opinions
bucket the screams and and
keeps to notice. circles
while we can't help moment,
how
it's hard to speak
sometimes. we are frustrated with
inconsistencies
allowing things to be just the way
they are and want to be,
always taking action
taking
leftandrighting with the leftandright
once
were a different way or that
the coin had landed on the
other face; we can't figure
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure
leads anywhere
the energy to say anything,
too many responses waiting
behind each option which never
positive, anywhere that
hurt anybody or dissipate
place and we begin to wonder if
happen or if we had somehow just
thought it all up out
of desperation and
confusion aimed at
particular, cycles going back and
forth
way, always surprising
somehow and adding to the
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the
nowhere and the feeling that we
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to say
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to
the way they are and stay the
same when they need to stay
they need to
even need to
need to change but maybe
instead want to stay the same or
want to change, or rather: it
just happens. it just
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the
even speaking about
going on or what's not going on
but instead just
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at that moment,
letting it out and letting it go,
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
in
moving around.
because the longer we
we
matter.