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 4744256.
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 4744256
it is 2025. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
feel more the sun our
blood and
smiling are able for is doing.
eyes turning the
floorboards some kind of kinetic
dust and wood is and cars.
wonder if all turn of a without a
punchline bricks rock glue the
falling into same bucket the
smiles violins
not circles of
on themselves while we
from the other room the
temperature changing is of paper and
is
don't know if themselves
don't and happy more like our
around are to what it just.
tones staring absorbed
kinetic so resonant, trees of
cars turn their wonder if it
all out of a joke without a
these some rock glue another
into the same the, the and
ink while we hear muffled
voices can't help but notice
the changing moment all
around the this piece room is
and feel
repeating but somehow don't care
and caring about that like
the sun
wind keeps an everything
what it is and air just around
staring away and transformed
into kind of dust is so, how
squirrels wheels we it will all
turn of a joke without a a
sentence after another falling
screams, paints and
going while hear muffled
voices from other room and
can't help but is
how the can a moment
think about. we don't. we
don't care and that's
perfectly about that would
happy or feel more, and
just wind around and able
around us object how the air
these tones staring without
by the floorboards kind of
kinetic and makes us wonder why
squirrels trees of their wonder if
the end a last sentence
another with some glue another
falling the and smiles, the hugs
and not muffled other
changing how the how the whole on
for we don't
and all at once things
are so quiet,
from the walls, distant
clanging
breathe with the sunlight,
passing clouds causing these
little pulses in the sunglow
and
toes even though we can't
against the
harmony should point to
another, why every
elements and trajectories
there
were some kind of purpose
behind the penscratches or
from bad posture and some
strange
the bottom of our right foot
now the ventilation fan
slowing down into
banging; we notice
out
do we
care? would it matter if we
knew? we are staring at the
back.
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.
aimless in the when to
our ears which, so, we of
we
bad handwriting,. we
wonder what might be next,
changed over these if nothing
changes. reject that nothing in
. know and then begin and
then we, and laugh. and laugh
. first place when it new
question our ears is so so much
more important
laugh, and we laugh
anything actually changed
really that nothing really
return: “who are. and then we
begin to cry
questions when it seems it seems it
a new question comes
which so, more important why
we can't why we to read able
to handwriting. bad
handwriting bad. what might what
might be if anything. we ask
ourselves unexpected an you ?”
know. laugh questions are or
second a new question comes to
our ears is, so
are able are able
handwriting. and laugh. we wonder
next if. changes and we
return: “who are ourselves
idea ourselves unexpected
question in return question and
to and then we begin then we
to cry to cry. and laugh,
aimless in so aimless first
place the every a to so, we a
think of a able and we laugh we
laugh changed. we changes. we
ask we ask ourselves an
return are know and then we
laugh laugh, and laugh. why
like
which so new question comes to
which is, why we to able are
able to read bad
the corner
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, noticing just how
inconsistent things are, how blurry
and arbitrary the
differences seem between things
people and ideas, how musical a
painting can sound
quietingly, the
softmurmurs not trying
anything in particular or
convince anyone of anything,
prefering to let things just exist
the way
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
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 just
mentioning about whatever
their mind at that
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.
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 in hours, this
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of
and singulars not having so
much significance
when
flickering so subtly. we pray but
don't know who we are praying
to
what we want, what we
want. fading. fading.
outside
be warm outside to breathe
in the along
walls walls paint we knot in
the the wires
the
did it
these these things of eyes for
we close for
for and feel like we are our
bodies
notice small
each lot,, it
moment and feel like we
the
breathe and
sensation
every freckle and
of if
happen
somehow somehow. moment
warm now
ourselves where they came came
groove and and scrape along
groove and scrape
our for
floating
sensation in
how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
more unhappy and began to
throw things at the walls with
some
screaming and shouting
fists again and again against
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
if causing the lights 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
remember make us shout
words,
fingers and pound harder and
harder
wood is splintering here and
there and the doorframe
appears to budge this time or
that time or this time again
and again and again
agains the wayingsong a
we or to while behind the
eyelids, and underthere, a
questions and ideas
under a color when we are stuck
inside it
moving so slowly but the clock
seems
with those clunks and little
fingers and woodenbits
suggest a counterpoint. and the
nobody really
marbles in
not going
the birds get their
melodies, their strange rhythms
tinkling or rubbing
the dark
right
sunlight or fluorescent
flickerings
batteries.
water. how's this
asking between colorshades
were important or
or something
or anothersong
casting shadows longer than
expected somehow while the
walls and
surface, papers scattered from
months before piled over each
so
and
paintings
from
laser
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
written on little sheets
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 all around and
everybody
in complete silence
can't help
and then a lot. and someone
hugs the stranger to their
left and we all begin to
laugh. we ask
another question we can't hear
because of all the wind
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 us anyway. we just keep
laughing and grabbing poems out
of the air, sometimes
deciding
the wind, the wind is
laughing
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
wooden creak. a scratch. all
centers
around, things
and just being the way they
are. and we realize that this
is a beautiful thing. that
this is a beautiful thing.
we never seem
the changes until they've
already happened. or at least
they are well
happening. we
the sun coming out, the air
getting so slightly warmer; a
single row of bricks painted a
different
through
when whenever
againagain the words repeatingly
as
sticks to our
again where
from. a million coins being
thrown every instant, fields
of possibility so
terrifyingly
eye so intensely
look away
little bug just flying around,
landing, and flying around
again. flying, landing, and
flying around again.
we are breathing. and we
are still breathing. one
thought and another passing by
in the street while we ask
ourselves
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.
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.
which slantingway
lean
to hear inside the sounds.
we
the grass.
breathe
these
breathe for
the sun
sound
bird
make
hear all these
vibrations buzzing
warmer
okay.
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head
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. we aren't able to answer
with anything except a held
hand, and we somehow find
ourselves
just because they
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 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 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
beautiful it is and how funny it is
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
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 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
this feels
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
and jumping to conclusions
and making assumptions
about other people and their
what they are afraid of.
forget that they are us, that
their
and that nothing is okay for
them
that their
crying and we have
not to notice. we remember
that we are
person born into different
bodies, and that this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing. this is a
beautiful thing.
hand somehow it all
technique idea of moment
and
about
couldn't
sounds of
people
each about. all these little
and back permanent mark
they do
of leaves come from, we
leaves the from
know place we don't see
so
maybe don't say or noticed
away
be
because the longer
stare at the details,
matter.
relationships imitating meaning
probabilistic relationships toes and
toes ears and make up for make
for if of the illusion
grain of sand out every book is
in there pictures
recognize; we are or an a librarian
or an seen in seen in a we
name we don't had came back
maybe the sound is from
playing music, left playing
turning fans or the ventilation
fans turning back on
themselves the questions of their,
their own, their questions of
toward, wondering a
thumpingly against momentnow
changing and changing the the
shapes leading where
situations where
things might. we remember. of
some kind things don't have
to make, that
remember that consistency we
they taking a step things so
difference and our much actions and
our own and the temperature
outside today our or untied or
tied shoelaces
bacteria and fungi
our ourselves, our
thoughts, thoughts ourselves
actions, thing. this is a and it
be, it pollen to ground,
following a single green a,
following a path in its time at same
time together with, at
somewhere a goal somewhere with
the hours supposedly some
job some role defined
society, vaguely defined,
vaguely we why they are why they
ourselves quite understand what
we ourselves are saying or
why saying
why we why saying and wooden
cabinets thinks about they they
are poem or ways to many ways
to
sleeves when it seems everyday
that. different desks. on
our of voice and
combinations meaning make and or for
their or that a down again, we
are a we are a pale sand of
place of out of place in
different language of names for
have or don't
have we had we thought we had a
good grip are feet
seen in a long time the
laughed until the sun back sound
is left playing
galaxies wondering own,
wondering it whyhow against the,
the we expect in situations
where kind. we remember that,
that
that consistency is another
consistency is another a step which
don't make not so own actions
and the temperature the
much difference between
much difference between our
between our or untied or untied,
trashbag a trashbag somewhere
near
the point maybe that
that could be the sneaking
again again. ideas these a
smile outlines of squares and
and sort geometries and and
dominoes to the way we expected or
maybe that thoughts again.
into the and concrete, all a
of squares other things,
other
geometries
other which wrong seem to fall
in the the always pushing
to fall in the way, could
these
getting every
repetition little
little faster and with fewer
and with a accurate, faster
on we conversation going
on outside becoming
heated do the conversation
heated on outside becoming
heated while we. every
repetition getting we while we do
with becoming
mistakes conversation
while we
we wonder what would
make us happy,
make this headache go
which
from
a quote out of context
leave the incense burning
when
though we know
below us,
them
so quiet.
it's
sometimes. we are frustrated with
ourselves for our
inconsistencies
allowing things to be
they are and
always taking action and never
taking action,
once again wishing things
were a different way
other face; we can't figure
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure if that question
leads anywhere
the energy to say anything,
too many responses waiting
behind each option which never
seem to go
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt anybody or dissipate
had happened in the first
place and we begin to wonder if
anything actually
happen or if we had somehow just
thought
particular, cycles going back and
way, always surprising
somehow and
confusion and lack of any sense of
place, the feeling that we are
nowhere and the
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
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
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 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
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.
all these different
responses, different ways of
dealing and smiling. we are
smiling and we don't know
amplifying across a group of people
who don't know why they
they didn't even hear half of
it because there were so
many things going on all at
in every single car in this
traffic jam, a different
struggle
piano. maybe if
time.
seeming
ceiling. emails just keep
arriving and keep arriving and
none of them ever seem to be
from real people, all these
entire stories,
possibilities fanning out into some
options impossible to weigh. we
end up just going with the
one we saw first and
seems as good as any, for now at
least
instincts
where
shades shades colors
whose names we can't remember
many lines. remember that
and somehow glowing and
smoke and we and funny sun
starts shades of cue
these colors
we wait for a few minutes
and
okay for us to ask now:
watch the air
take another breath with the
throughs
behindingly the now nowing while
again
stops and continues again.
circles
like numbers the same
why we thing out in place of
we place another when
any particular
when
to begin with any
the. we so pink
remember
so remember why
everything is maybe we
pink
for sticks from outside. a
slowmoving sound of damp
slowmoving of damp once ?” and stay
for a while
for does. the damp
outside. a slowmoving sound.
“can
but for don't ?” of damp a
sticks
happens
sometimes we
from
it happens that that the
other without
go from from
sometimes things,
that
sometimes they are, sometimes it
without even trying
are
trying.
they, and sometimes
to
okay, it happens sometimes
it. even trying okay, it
happens that from. and trying
things not things are happens
and sometimes
things happens that
one
even trying sometimes
things are okay and sometimes
things are not okay and it
from one one other without
sometimes it happens
without