CS 470 Etude 1

The writing process for these poems was both frustrating and rewarding. My frustration stemmed in part from learning the idiosyncrasies of ChucK and getting a good sense of how to co-ordinate the appearance of words with sound. However ultimately the experience was rewarding because I was able to create two pieces in a previously unexplored medium of poetry, and was able to do two slightly different things with them.

They Love Me Not

The first poem “They Love Me Not” details the uncertainty of a pining lover unsure if their romantic interest reciprocates their feelings. The display of the ASCII art flower and its slow removal of petals mirrors the act of plucking petals while contemplating the interest’s feelings. The Degeneration poem was good inspiration here—I wanted the user to be the one who had to trigger the process of plucking as if to make them feel as if thinking about their romantic other was an intentional choice. The Shepard tones are being incremented positively when in the “They Love Me” frame of mind, to create the sense of warmth at the possibility of feelings being reciprocated, and negatively when fearful that they do not. The text itself follows the degeneration pattern exhibited by the original piece.

Winter Rain

Winter Rain was written as an ode to rainy NorCal winters. It had been raining all day at the time of my constructing this poem, so it was only fitting that the poem featured rain clouds and word2Vec similarity words pouring down. I like to think that the apparent dissimilarity of the words and the irregularity in their spacing mirror the irregular showers and scattered thoughts I have as I stare out of my window will working these days.