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 669065.
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 669065
it is 2026. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
we
which
from
leave the incense burning
when we go to
though we know
hazard and it puts our
danger and the lives of all the
other
below
we know and the people who
even
them
we
so quiet.
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.
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
pages an actual answer to a
question that matters. a new pair
of jeans, a
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: now
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
lost somewhere in the mix,
the breath being exhaled
before we even noticed
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
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
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 wait for a few minutes
and wonder if
okay for us to ask now: "is
this beautiful?" we wonder
if nobody
watch
around through the leaves. we
take another
sunlight
throughs
stops and continues again.
allergies we
slantingway
one
hear we
pause
longer
call
people laughing and
buzzing
vibrations buzzing inside
making and
vibrations more
fuzzy
thisthat
hand thisthat theringly,
again
sun sniffling from
seasonal recognize call we
of
against sort
buzzing hear all all hear
these acoustic
feel not warmer
feel
our ears closer
hear inside
the thisthat again
from call bird
it's hard to speak
sometimes. we are frustrated with
ourselves for our
inconsistencies
allowing things to be
they are and want to be,
always
taking action,
leftandrighting with
once again wishing things
were
the coin had landed on the
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure if that question
leads
the energy to say anything,
too many responses waiting
seem to go anywhere
positive, anywhere that doesn't
into the grass as if nothing
had
place
anything actually did or does
happen or if we had
thought it all up out of some kind
of desperation and
confusion aimed at nothing in
particular,
way,
somehow and adding
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling
nowhere and the
are getting nowhere.
we listen
of all these people
destination as
other how they learned about
different
little motions,
back
dams and
figure
in
from, whether we made it
or if maybe
could really
maybe the leaves decided or
in
grid patterns
look at the branches from
below. and
comes walking by
place,
don't
they noticed us looking
and
just not
sometimes we can just be
ourselves.
and they walk out of sight.
and another thing happens
isn't
different shapes.
the
hand but
sticks to
remains perfectly legible.
were hoping
a word
help us
wouldn't have
maybe
or execution would be
question
for a moment, and let
our
couldn't prepare us for
the smell of damp sticks
from
sound. we notice how
remember
don't. “can it
for a while?” and, for once,
it does.
again. ideas ideas
spray paints and concrete,
all with it all just smile.
it squares of making and
trangles themselves
geometries geometries and
relationships pushing buttons and and
fall in the wrong direction
the way we,,,, sneaking
spray paints and ideas
permeating while we and we all just
happens
permeating while we watch. and
ideas permeating while we
watch
smile. it all all and sort up
behind the geometries
geometries seem to fall in the
expected maybe expected but
maybe the point.. goals
sneaking spray
because the
stare at the details, the less
we are sure they even
matter.
ask anywhere instead be
focusing on like the way be
focusing on instead be focusing
else like the incense away
from away from the incense
when blink place rushing:
lands on singing. we are
breathing are breathing. and we
are still breathing the
street while and another one
thought and another and another
while we the ourselves if we
another by in the going anywhere
going anywhere
drifting the smoke on way
drifting away from the sound when
is place for? the about
singing. breathing we ask
ourselves anywhere
instead be focusing on
something else way stick is there
us our. it we
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying to say
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let things just exist
the way they
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
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
their mind at that moment,
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
in the air just sort of
moving around.
we never seem to notice
the changes until they've
already happened. or at least
they are well into
happening. we wonder why that
the
the sun
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row
different color.
through before
when whenever the
againagain the words repeatingly
as we notice a little
cottonfluff drifting toward us.
sticks to our ink, and we ask
from.
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
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 around again.
happening
two at the same someone
listen
listened
scheduling and be breakfast
tomorrow in place why we
thing out in
just
suspect
things happening time might
sound like were
about scheduling and start
books and
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
wooden creak. a scratch. all
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
really changes you we
are so are so first the first
place when it seems when it
like every is more important
so, is like we can't with at
the with at. we handwriting
we laugh, and laugh, and.
we and what might nothing
ever really changes. we
reject we an ourselves an
unexpected question to answer know
we are unable. we and,, why
first seems every a new
question
the corner
empty
grooves in the floorboard, we
smile. the moments going and
going
that
off it, noticing just how
inconsistent things are, how blurry
and arbitrary the
differences seem between things and
people and ideas, how musical
painting can sound
seems to dry.
we expect sense of some
happen just is allowing things
which mean allowing things
which don't so actions and the
actions today or off, being we
remember ourselves that, and
actions is a thing. and
thing let watch at the
separate
call society being pushed on
understand they ourselves
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
paper and everybody in the
world began to read them out
loud all at the same time and
then the wind began to blow
and the poems went flying in
the air
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
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
and beautiful things all
around us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing
of the air, sometimes
deciding to
othertimes using them as napkins.
the wind, the wind is
laughing too.
laughing
the sun
whose of these colors lines
whose and and lines and so many
somehow
sun starts
right starts cue
on cue
colors
can't remember
lines the stick
somehow becoming our lungs
and and and breathe. forget
questions breathe we ask..
laughing it
starts coming back cue
names we can't names we
remember names so. we
and is still incense is
glowing lungs ask questions.
laughing but smile smile
so remember that somehow
in our lungs smoke
incense
lungs
breathe and we we forget to ask
questions. laughing isn't it
funny when help when the sun
starts coming back right on we
can't
many lines so many
incense is
many many many and lines
that the we remember that the
still glowing and somehow
glowing and somehow becoming in
our
forget to ask ask questions.
sun starts coming back sun
little fingers and woodenbits
we
. and the. and
conversation stays
wayingsong a eyes again and under a
we a are things things
these to clock seems to be
working with suggest
really
seems to wind.
wayingsong
and underthere,
eyes again with color are
stuck we are
possibilities fanning
tree, options after
impossible we we saw first and with
the one we saw first for now
at
circumstances different responses,
different ways of
why
because one across a
people who don't the joke group
of people
they don't
was even they they it
because funny when they didn't
when were,
traffic in traffic jam
struggle
and another arriving
ever seem to be
people,, all these situations
branching out some
after options impossible to
weigh up just going with one
that at least looking for
them calling, different
smiling and we don't smiled and
we ways of for. all these
different
remember for
how
questions which keep making their
way inside
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw things at
some inexpressible
screaming and shouting with a red
face and bulging veins,
fists again and again against
the door not even caring
what's on the other side, too
door being there in the first
place
if causing the lights to
flicker and
smell
burning so we all try to remember
kitchen last but we can't
remember,
words, make us
fingers and pound harder and
harder
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to budge
and again and again
sometimes things
happens the other without
trying., from one without. and
sometimes it
sometimes and
sometimes they are,
they are sometimes
sometimes it happens we even
that we go from one to other
sometimes are not okay, and
sometimes one
be sentence rock
falling into screams
we keep doing ink we hear
the room we can't but notice
the temperature us is whole
room is can somehow it we
anything at all if but somehow we
okay caring never have made
us, more the and skin just
keeps going, the around a
little keep and in an see
everything around us every doing,
the air just tones without
away, kind of kinetic energy
of resonant cars turn we
out, a story without bricks
clinging to one another with and
facts falling, the, the and
timer keeps ticking we
systems all around us
and
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
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of our skulls, plurals
and singulars not having so
when the lights are
flickering so subtly. we
don't know who we are praying
to
what
want. fading. fading.
not going anywhere in
particular seeming
the birds get
tinkling or rubbing cardboard.
the dark
right back, eyes glimmering
so loudly
flickerings or uncharged
batteries.
water. how's this
asking between
and subject matter like it
were
thismomentingly
casting shadows
expected
walls and
other,
so much, some with colors
from
laser
that means, whatever those
meaning.
how each if it
if
just sort of
that it might be warm enough
feel small where they
floorboard
every freckle and
the and scratch
freckle of every and of freckle
behind sort
just sort
bodies are floating bodies,,
incense is
what the
someone someone did things just
sort
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
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.
faster fewer mistakes.
fewer little fewer mistakes.
going best to our best to
aren't listening. every
repetition little more a
more a more accurate, the
conversation going on conversation
going on fewer mistakes,
every repetition. little
fewer mistakes, listening,
listening our best to pretend we
aren't every to pretend we
aren't
listening do our best do to
becoming heated while the
conversation going on outside
becoming heated best listening
aren't getting every little
mistakes on outside
conversation mistakes conversation
listening repetition to pretend
little more accurate a every
repetition pretend best
we accidentally
imagine
a
shaped box or a bird feeder with
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.
with anything except a held
hand, and we somehow find
ourselves caring more
just because they asked.
they can't answer either,
and the grip gets tighter
contact but that's okay because
we aren't looking anyway
and we are both these
strange wooden boxes attached
to bodies, heads
eyes which
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 in particular
and everything in
particular, wanting to want
everything and wanting to
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
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
smile a little but somehow
this feels impossible. we
get
do things we don't want to
do,
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
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
and all
are so quiet, a tiny hiss
from
clanging of a ventilation fan. we
passing clouds causing
little
toes even though we can't
quite tell why
chooses the pitches it sings
against
another, why every story has some
sort of climax where
elements and trajectories
culminate into some bigger thing
as if we had been
there all
were some kind of purpose
behind
fall in this rotting pile
notice a pain in our lower
from bad posture
slowing down into a periodic
banging; we notice a
the
out which side it landed on.
care?
knew?
coin and the coin is staring
back.