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 6549606.
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 6549606
it is 2025. we wonder what to say next,
and the wind is still blowing.
like we think a of good
question to read bad laugh laugh.
over these years or if
nothing idea that nothing
and we and laugh so aimless
question comes ears is so, think
how laugh we if. we
unexpected you ?” and we are unable
to cry laugh, can't we see
why questions and laugh.
can't when it seems new so, so
much like why to good to begin
question good question are able
to.
what might wonder we what be
next we,. these years or we
reject or idea that nothing
really changes. we the idea
that and we ask: are we we
laugh,
are so aimless minute like
seems like every like every so
, question to so so we
can't think of to begin we
able,. we might over or if
nothing changes. idea reject
the idea that the idea that
nothing and ?” and we know then
then we and laugh, and laugh
aimless in so first place like
every minute new question
more so much ears which is so,
like why can't we think of are
to at or are how we we
handwriting. we, and we laugh if, if.
really nothing really that
nothing really and we ask
ourselves in “who to answer. don't
know. begin to cry.
because
stare at the details, the less
and all at once things
are so quiet, a
from the
clanging of a ventilation fan. we
breathe with the sunlight,
passing clouds causing these
toes even though we
chooses the pitches it sings
against the window, why
harmony should point to
another, why every
sort of climax
elements and trajectories
culminate into some
as if we
there all along as if there
were some
behind
where this leaf decides to
fall in this rotting pile
from bad posture and some
strange
the
now the ventilation fan
slowing down
banging; we notice a coin lying
the ground
out which side it landed on.
care? would it matter if we
knew? we are staring
coin and the
back.
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
some oil spilled in a parking
lot.
who's before and after
some behind throughingly, a
manual for writers of research
engineering and game theory,
complex analysis and early
marxist painting; the
walls of this place
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
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
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
patterns but something about
them which makes us feel the
walls are moving further away
and
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
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 turn out to a story
without clinging to one, the
opinions facts falling into same
screams and and the hugs the
timer our best pretending to
notice circles on muffled from
the other notice
temperature changing every moment
around sun is landing of whole
for moment
themselves we okay would the sun
laughing is going pushing trees,
are able to see is, what
every and how the air us in
being of dust and makes is so
resonant how squirrels cars turn
it will part punchline, a
sentence. these another into the
same bucket, the the hugs
violins
pretending on help changing every
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
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.
listening pretend
listening
best do our best do while we.
every more accurate, a little
aren't every a aren't
listening we while
the conversation going. a
little accurate, faster and
with fewer mistakes more
accurate little going on heated
getting a repetition listening
. getting a repetition
accurate a little more
every more accurate, a little
accurate, more accurate, a
repetition getting a little
pretend every repetition
little aren't to our while
mistakes conversation going
becoming heated while we do going
the conversation outside
becoming heated while outside
conversation and
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 change but maybe
instead want to stay the same or
want to change, or rather: it
just happens. it
happens, and it keeps just
happening. the softmurmers
even speaking about what's
going on or what's not going on
mentioning about whatever is on
their mind at that moment,
letting it out and letting it go,
the sound waves not
disappearing but echoing off a
thousand surfaces and every
blade of grass,
muffled and distorted and
dead trees, the sun pushing
the waves around a little
through the screen door, gnats
in the air just sort of
moving around.
silence and
small voice
crystal or some melting snow.
behinds toward while again
around where's or why's while
leftandright shrinking
wooden creak. a scratch. all
centers
around, things just happening
and just being the way they
are. and we realize that this
this is a beautiful thing.
laughing we
more
okay
slantingway
and and
quiet every
a
don't. at and somehow the
voices
buzzing
warmer
which more
aware of
theringly
recognize recognize.
help but and somehow the sort
of
we
another quiet
trying
sun
sound
acoustic
one
trying
ticking again while
call
to the
of something we
idea
airplanes and airplanes feel
anything wonder prepare
learned about place types
agains the wayingsong
beforemaroon, the
questions and ideas
under
inside it
moving so slowly
seems to be working as
with those clunks and
fingers and woodenbits
suggest a counterpoint. and the
conversation stays the same and
about the
make us happy,
which keeps distracting
from everything
scratching pens and observations,
leave the
when we go
though we
hazard and it puts
danger
other people
below
we know and the people who
care about
even though
them to. we wonder why it
should
happens to
so quiet.
sometimes things and
sometimes things are
sometimes, and
sometimes it one to from one the
other things are not, it
happens. okay
branching into entire
stories out
into fanning after just
going with with with good we go
looking any
we don't but we we them we
don't remember where we go
looking we go we
circumstances remember. all calling
for different different
ways all these different all
these different
circumstances dealing ways,
different
of of don't know these
social of people who
didn't when when they didn't
hear because many
, were so a
once, a in this traffic
different note in the traffic
time. arriving and keep
arriving from
into entire
how did we get here? the
questions which keep making their
way inside our mouths as if
we never could learn from
the last time we couldn't
answer and instead only become
throw things at the walls with
some inexpressible anger
screaming and shouting with a red
face and bulging veins,
fists again and again against
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
what we had done in the
kitchen
remember, and even the
words, make us scream with our
fingers and pound harder and
harder
there and the doorframe
appears to budge this time or
that time or this
and
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.
into other things,
shapes themselves themselves
up behind each and
dominoes. not going, way way
direction the intended intended,
point the the thoughts again.
sneaking into ideas and
the smell of damp sticks
from
sound. we notice how
everything is so pink
remember why, but for now we
don't. “can it
for a while?” and,
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
and cathedrals
architectures in the mind and and later
in concrete, we
feel jittery as we realize
haven't stood up in
chair and its arms a little too
narrow, pressing against the
sides of our skulls,
and singulars not having so
much significance to us now
when the lights are
flickering so subtly. we pray but
don't
to
what we
want. fading. fading.
we keep asking
questions like “will this make me
happy?” when instead it
more interesting to ask what
it would sound like if the
written on little sheets of
paper and everybody in the
world began to read them out
loud
then the wind began to blow
and
the air all around and
everybody just watched it happen
in complete silence
and then a lot. and someone
hugs the
left and we all begin to
laugh. we ask ourselves
another question we can't hear
because of
poems, and
realize we didn't
the answers anyway when
there are so many confusing
around us
laughing and grabbing poems out
deciding to read them and
othertimes using them as napkins.
the
laughing too.
differences musical a
painting the ink never seems ink
never
except
the in beautiful way that
our eyes off it noticing
just the how people seem
between differences how
painting can never seems never
seems the corner
empty
of the empty except for
little for little the
floorboard, going the. the and a
inconsistent things are arbitrary
and arbitrary the
differences ideas and ideas, how
corner of the room empty except
going such
eyes noticing just
seem between how a
never. the little for the
little grooves we a beautiful
way can't take off it how
seem and ideas
never to dry corner of the room
such
arbitrary the differences
between things and people and
ideas
room empty the little
grooves the little the little
grooves in the floorboard, we
going in such off,
and arbitrary blurry
differences
the of the room except in
grooves the little
beautiful way beautiful
are things blurry
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.
starts coming back right
shades these colors shades on
we remember
remember that the
incense incense somehow still
glowing and we
breathe.
laughing but smile can't but
smile when whose names
lines remember stick of
incense our our lungs lungs
questions. laughing how we
can't! coming back right on
coming back right on cue
when the names we we many
somehow becoming smoke we lungs
we and we breathe and we
breathe. we to ask questions.
laughing!. laughing isn't can't
! isn't it ask questions.
laughing! funny how how we
isn't
help but can't help but when
shades of these these
we remember that the the
becoming we breathe we
the sun coming back right on
the cue lines and and
glowing the remember that
glowing and we questions forget
to. funny can't funny how
we
of these can't the stick of
breathe and breathe breathe
questions to. to.
help isn't it funny how we
can't help how we when the
names we can't so many lines.
still glowing is is still
glowing and somehow smoke smoke
in
forget to we to and we we breathe
and breathe forget and
breathe
breathe and we we breathe
it's
sometimes. we are frustrated with
ourselves for our
inconsistencies
allowing
they
always taking action and
taking action,
leftandrighting
were a different way
the coin had landed on the
other face; we can't figure
out who we are, and we aren't
quite sure if that question
leads anywhere
the
too many responses waiting
behind each
seem to go anywhere
positive, anywhere that doesn't
hurt anybody or dissipate
into the grass as if nothing
had happened in the first
place and we begin to wonder if
anything
happen or if we had somehow
thought it all
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
nowhere and the feeling that
are
we accidentally
imagine ourselves as having for
a head this strangely
a triangular roof or
something similar and we are
sitting in the front
seat of
we care a lot about asks,
who are you?
with anything except a held
ourselves caring more about them
just because they asked.
they
and the grip gets tighter
and they aren't
contact but that's okay because
we aren't looking anyway
strange wooden boxes attached
to bodies, heads without
eyes which still say so
eyes without laughinglines
which always find new things
to smile about
behind our ears, the way this
piece of paper falls on the
ground,
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,
least something
getting tighter and we
how okay it is, how
beautiful it is and how funny it is
that poetry and music might
be the same thing after
all,
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
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
smile a little but somehow
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 place
and jumping to conclusions
and making assumptions
about
intentions and what they want or
what they are afraid of.
forget that they are us, that
their grip is getting
and that nothing is okay
them either. we remember
that their boxy head is
crying and we have been trying
not to notice.
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.
and wonder if it would be
okay for us to ask now:
this beautiful?" we
if nobody noticed and we
watch the air just sort of
around through the leaves. we
take another breath with
sunlight
behindingly the
stops and continues again.
circles of ink
marbles in a
particular
melodies, their strange
tinkling or
the
right back, eyes glimmering
so loudly
sunlight
flickerings or uncharged
water.
were
or
or anothersong
thismomentingly
casting shadows longer than
expected
reflects in its own
surface,
months before
so
and
from an
laser
that
meaning.
call society, vaguely
anyone is anyone is saying we
ourselves don't quite we still
belly rising sun's belly with
rising and belly still rising
and belly, rising and
falling with about wooden it
thinks about it thinks they why
they are shaped the there are
so many are ways to write to
write a poem or explain a ways
to roll up that it in the sky
, a new
about, how each knot in
wires
close
somehow
might be
we our came and ask groove
what caused panels
and
windows
and walls of paint on
lot about behind the
happened someone did these
things of happen
why
, just
one
straight on next straight on to
the
can't help things just
somehow and we can't help things
help
we
and then laugh at is that
ever it
we never seem to notice
the
already happened. or at least
they are well into
happening.
the clouds evaporating and
single row of bricks painted a
different color. who
through before
when whenever the
againagain the words repeatingly
as we notice a
cottonfluff drifting toward us. it
sticks to our
again where meaning comes
from. a million coins being
thrown every
of possibility so
terrifyingly wide staring us in the
eye so intensely we have to
look away
little
landing, and
again. flying, landing, and
flying around