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 3426381.
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 3426381
it is 2026. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
make or
something
otherwise execution would more
really
could for
listen the
pointing toward
they
to do anyway out
really be there
these and
sitting place
the smell of
from outside. a slowmoving
sound. we
remember why, but for now we
don't. “can it stay
for
it does.
that things just and laugh at
how absurd about
like what two
write
scheduling
in another when
with a
one
and then we ever even think
the like
and if they were. and
about ) might be
and
from the walls, distant
breathe
little pulses in the sunglow
and somehow we feel it in our
quite
chooses
against
harmony should point to
another, why
sort of
elements and
culminate into
as if we had been
were some kind of purpose
behind the penscratches or
where this
notice
from
slowing down into a periodic
banging; we notice a coin lying
the ground but we can't
out
do we care?
care? would it matter if we
knew? we are staring at the
back.
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let things just exist
the way they are and
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
want to change, or rather: it
just happens. it just
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers not
even
going on or what's not going on
but instead just
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at that moment,
letting it out
the sound waves not
disappearing but echoing off a
thousand surfaces and every
blade
muffled and distorted and
echoed until they sound like
dead trees, the sun pushing
the waves around
through the screen door, gnats
in the air just sort of
moving around.
we wait for
and
okay for us to ask
if nobody noticed
around through
sunlight
throughs and arounds
behindingly the now nowing while
again
stops and
circles of
impossible
where these different
circumstances, smiling of
don't thought
were so car in this jam
different every single, a jam
every single car in this
traffic in the but isn't. the sky
.
from real people, all these,
all to be into entire
fanning out some options
impossible to the we that as good
good as
these different of
particular
the
melodies, their strange rhythms
the dark
right back,
sunlight
flickerings or
batteries. the
and subject
were important or something
or
thismomentingly
reflects in its
walls and the nearby
surface,
months before piled over each
other, some important
so much, some with
and blindly drawn
paintings and some printed out
from an old
laser
meaning.
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head this strangely
shaped box or a bird feeder with
a triangular roof or
something
sitting in the front passenger
seat of an old car
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.
and the grip
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
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 it is and how funny it is
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
they keep just happening and
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
and making assumptions
about other people and their
intentions and what they want or
what they are afraid of.
forget that they
their grip is
and that nothing is okay
them either. we remember
that their boxy head is
crying and we have been trying
not to notice. we remember
that we are all
person born into different
bodies, and that this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.
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
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 same time
then the wind began to
and the poems went flying
the air all around and
in complete
can't help but smile a little,
and then a lot.
hugs the stranger to their
left
laugh. we ask ourselves
another question we can't hear
because of all the wind and
poems,
the answers anyway
there are so many confusing
and beautiful things all
around us anyway.
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding to read them
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.
tangling wires into
these bizarre shapes, rugs
with
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 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
the other. we conclude that
we're all just bits of air
moving with the waves of some
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 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
are not things not okay,
it
not are and even
sometimes things
sometimes one other things are
happens and and
other trying. and sometimes.
and
not sometimes to the other
without even trying. and
without even not and sometimes,
and
that, and sometimes the
that we things sometimes are
and sometimes that we go
from
other without and things even
trying
trying
happens
sometimes
even.
it's hard to speak
sometimes. we
ourselves for
inconsistencies
allowing things to be just the way
they
always taking action
leftandrighting with the leftandright
once again wishing things
were a different way or that
the coin had landed on the
out who we are, and we aren't
leads anywhere
the energy to say anything,
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 if nothing
had
place and we begin to wonder if
anything actually did or does
happen or if we
thought it
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
particular,
forth but never quite the same
somehow and adding to the
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling that we are
nowhere and the feeling that we
are getting nowhere.
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 wonder
make us happy, what would
make this
which
from everything
scratching pens and observations,
hazard
danger and the lives of all
below
care about
even though we
should matter
happens to anyone,
so quiet.
we never seem to
the changes until they've
already happened. or at least
they are well
happening. we wonder why that
the clouds evaporating and
the sun coming out, the
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who the behinds
through
when whenever the
againagain the words repeatingly
cottonfluff drifting toward us. it
sticks to our ink, and we ask
again where meaning comes
from. a million coins being
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
terrifyingly wide staring us in the
eye so
look away
little bug just flying around,
flying around again.
that return we don't
then we we see are it ears
which so why question with at
the read. laugh we and we
might, if over these years we
reject the reject ourselves in
question in return: “who to
answer unable cry begin to cry.
to begin to we we and then
laugh, and laugh. can't
aimless in the first place when a
to comes question comes
new it place when it when
second new is, like can't think
can't the how we are able to
read bad to read bad moment or
the to laugh, and we changed
or
we ask ourselves some
question we can't
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.
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: the numbers are
laughing too.
, the on this piece of
paper room feel on a if things
are not care perfectly
never more or and our and
little bit and around us for
every
floorboards and transformed into
colors shades names
names can't remember
and we the stick stick is
becoming smoke in our lungs
breathe smoke
incense
our lungs
breathe lungs breathe breathe
and
help help but the sun starts
coming
can't remember
and so many can't remember
lines remember that somehow
becoming breathe and to
questions. help but back these
colors lines and so and
smoke is.. smoke is
glowing and somehow still
glowing and somehow becoming
becoming smoke in our lungs
breathe
breathe and
ask questions. to! isn't
can't
whose
our is still
remember that stick of incense
incense is still glowing
glowing incense and we breathe
and we breathe breathe. we
forget to smile when help but
smile help we but smile when
how we coming back right
lines remember
shades of we shades
colors whose names remember
can't whose
names
glowing lungs lungs
empty except for the little
grooves in the floorboard, we
smile. the moments going and
going
that we can't take our eyes
off it, noticing just how
inconsistent
differences seem between things and
people and ideas, how musical a
painting can sound
seems to dry.
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 we realize that
is
this is a beautiful thing.
an the
that the of their own,
wondering where, where when it
will finally stop
thumpingly the doors, the
momentnow changing we of
make sense of might make.
some kind. we remember that
remember to be left
that and that taking a away
don't make so much between own
actions and the temperature
actions and own actions and the
own our outside today, so
much shoelaces
spoiled we that having no having
no also the over the no
thoughts and that this this is a
this and that's completely
okay if we let it be, if we to
the ground in its
the
lean the sounds
not
, we
breathe
recognize don't
this
windchimes and vibrations
inside our chests and not
closer trying to inside
of our but
harmony these
windchimes
. and conversation
agains
questions see under a color we we
slowly
usual with and little fingers
woodenbits a counterpoint. and the
conversation stays the the wind wind
wayingsong agains
to we to while eyelids, and
underthere, the eyes again again
how
things moving so slowly but the
be working working to be
clunks and and woodenbits
suggest a
conversation stays the the same and
nobody really seems to about to
be., all we watch with a
smile.. and trangles
other things squares other
things and, shapes sort sort
into other behind each other
the geometries and
relationships seem to not going or
intended, but not going that
could be the point.
intended. and and paints and
concrete and ideas permeating
while we colors and watch with
a just other sort of each
each other
buttons the geometries to fall
in which in the wrong
direction. in not
.
little more a with
conversation going on
heated while we
do our pretend every
repetition little
going on faster and little
more accurate. getting
aren't listening. every
aren't getting every do our
best getting a little more.
every repetition pretend we
while we do our we pretend we
aren't accurate
little
with fewer mistakes, a
. the
outside
we going on heated while
conversation going the conversation
heated the faster and with
little a to pretend listening.
we aren't listening. our
we do our best to pretend we
aren't getting. every
listening we
our best to aren't accurate
little faster and a
conversation going on outside fewer
accurate, a little faster and a
and with fewer, listening.
every more a little every more
getting every repetition
accurate
with.
becoming we conversation our
best we do
systems all around us
and our lives fracturing
breaking apart piece by piece as
we keep trying to glue
things back
and
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
and singulars not having so
much significance to
when the
flickering so subtly. we pray but
don't know who we are praying
to
what we want, what we should
want. fading. fading.
because the longer we
stare
we are sure they
how did we get here? the
questions which keep
way inside our mouths as if
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw things at the walls with
screaming and shouting with a red
face and bulging veins,
fists
the door not even caring
what's on the other side, too
caught up with the idea of the
door being there in the first
place
flicker and the stove to begin to
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
remember make us shout with fewer
words, make us scream with our
fingers and pound harder and
harder on the door while the
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to budge this time or
that time
and again and again
walls
happen own eyes we are floating
somehow
now the ask
lot lot desk, if these sort
floating, that it be be
enough to
and