_____ _            __     ___ _ _                  _ _
|_   _| |__   ___   \ \   / (_) | | __ _ _ __   ___| | | ___
  | | | '_ \ / _ \   \ \ / /| | | |/ _` | '_ \ / _ \ | |/ _ \
  | | | | | |  __/    \ V / | | | | (_| | | | |  __/ | |  __/
  |_| |_| |_|\___|     \_/  |_|_|_|\__,_|_| |_|\___|_|_|\___|

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~ a meditation on form and obsession ~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The Villanelle Generator

A procedurally generated villanelle on the theme of memory. These are not Dylan Thomas—no algorithm could be—but they follow his form.

night
time
memory
love
nature
loss
hope
wandering
When music brings it back, I know the outcast The places rebuilt in dreams haunts in the find And what reshapes now will always wind Though faces blur and fade through the last We learn to let the faces blur and fade remind When music brings it back, I know the outcast What seems so blast might come to cast And every touch recalls the lost will reshapes and defined And what reshapes now will always wind The outcast holds more than meets the eye While something haunts in the wind When music brings it back, I know the outcast We cannot know how last will try To shape what reshapes beneath the find And what reshapes now will always wind So when the music brings it back haunts by And places rebuilt in dreams reshapes in the remind When music brings it back, I know the outcast And what reshapes now will always wind

Seed a Villanelle

Enter any word to generate a unique villanelle:

About Generated Villanelles

These villanelles are assembled from word banks themed to their subject matter. Each theme contains ten rhyming words for the 'a' sound, ten for the 'b' sound, ten images, and ten verbs. The generator constructs refrains and fills in the tercets according to the traditional pattern.

The results are imperfect by design—no algorithm can match human craft. But they demonstrate the form's structure and might spark your own attempts.