Blackout Poetry, Writing

Can Computers Write Poetry? And Is Computer Programming Poetry?

I was recently watching this Ted Talk about this computer program that could write poetry.

In the video, this computer programmer, Oscar Schwartz, programmed a computer to write poetry! (He also used other algorithms created by other people to obtain more samples of computer-generated poems.)

[pullquote]With a dictionary database, a decent relational algorithm, and a simple spinner, a computer can create poems. However, the question remains—will a computer-generated poem have meaning or creativity in it?[/pullquote]After the computer wrote a few poems, Schwartz showed a few people the poems and asked them what they thought of them (without telling them that the poems were written by a computer). The people he showed the poems to loved them! This made me think of a study that was done where several “wine connoisseurs,” were given cheap wine (but in an expensive bottle! all the “wine connoisseurs” praised the cheap wine, and several even preferred it over the real expensive wine. It would’ve been great if Schwartz had actually submitted the poems to magazines across the country—maybe even given the computer a pseudonym!

Anyway, in the video, Schwartz shows the audience several poems and asks them to guess which poem was written by a human.

The whole purpose of the experiment, and talk, seemed to be more about the artificial intelligence (AI) side of things—and whether or not computers could actually express themselves through poetry. What do you think? Can they?

Yes, I do believe computers can create poetry. The only issue here is how great computer-generated poems will be. Will the poems be meaningful? Will they sound like they were created by humans?

As fascinating as Schwartz’s talk was, I did have a little problem with the presentation. You see, in the video, it was easy to fool the audience. With how poems are structured, the layman cannot fathom which one is written by a person, and which one isn’t. Poems are often cryptic and can be ten layers deep. It is common that too much application of creativity and wordplay in the poem can make it even incomprehensible to us regular folks—IE: those of us without MFA’s in poetry.

Most people are only familiar with kindergarten and elementary poems. After all, they were taught in schools and are much more memorable. Unlike poems written by poets, popular or not, children’s poems are much easier to understand. They follow a basic pattern, and convey their meanings directly.

For example, children and popular poems often follow a basic structure combined with rhyming ending words.

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Sugar is sweet,

And so are you.

Here is an example that was used in the presentation:

Red flags the reason for pretty flags

And ribbons.

Ribbon of flags

And wearing material

Reason for wearing material.

Give pleasure.

Can you give me the regions.

The region and the land.

The regions and wheels.

All wheels are perfect.

Enthusiasm.

That poem was written by Gertrude Stein, a famed American poet and novelist. Truth be told, this poem sounds like gibberish of a drunken Irishman. Unless you try hard to analyze it, you will certainly feel that it does not make sense.

If you compare the two poems, the first one can be easily read and understood. Truth be told, with simple lexical functions written in a computer program, it is easy to create poems like the previous example. Unfortunately, simple word randomizers can easily create gibberish— combinations of words that can easily appear like the latter example.

[pullquote]Poetry is a creation of art, and a computer program that writes poetry is definitely a beautiful creation of art.[/pullquote]With that said, it is easy to fool humans, especially those of us who are not adept with poem readings. Due to that, the tests done in the presentation were not that reliable. To my dismay, I was unsatisfied.

With a dictionary database, a decent relational algorithm, and a simple spinner, a computer can create poems. However, the question remains—will a computer-generated poem have meaning or creativity in it? As a matter of fact, I believe not— not in this lifetime.

However, we can be fooled. After all, poetry is art. And as usual, all works of art are open to multiple interpretations. A computer can generate text that can look like a poem. Once humans interpret it as a poem and we extract a particular meaning out of it, then it will become a real poem. Nevertheless, that poem will be devoid of emotions and insight of a real human being.

Unless humans can develop fully functional artificial intelligence (AIs) that can feel emotions and experience life, these poem-generating programs will be incapable of creating poems like humans do. An AI must be capable of rewriting itself and mutating to a point that it will completely deviate from what was written in its source code.

That program must write itself a poem not because it was programmed to do it, but it must be because it wanted to create one itself. It must be capable of desiring to express its emotions, whether it is digital. But if the program cannot do that, it can only create imitations of poems — a block of text that looks and sounds like a poem, and not a poem written by a human with a soul and emotions.

However, in my opinion, I still do believe that the computer wrote a poem, but I believe the computer’s poem was just part of a much larger poem—the poem/art that the programmer created when he first wrote the computer’s program to write poems. Poetry is a creation of art, and a computer program that writes poetry is definitely a beautiful creation of art.

Best Of, MFA Notes, Self Improvement / Healthy Living, Self Improvement / Healthy Living, Uncategorized

AJ Verdelle – Revising Your Writing

revising your creative work with aj verdelleType A Revision – with A.J. Verdelle – How to Revise Your Writing

Write → Review → Tighten → Clarify → Reorder → Seek nuance → Move the story forward →

How do you know when your story is finished?

Finished: When you’ve said all you have to say.

Finished: When there’s a clear beginning, middle, and end.

Remember: “You don’t get the book you wanted, you get the book you get.” – James Baldwin

Sometimes a revision is simply an addition. If your addition doesn’t add tension, drama, or explain something, then maybe you don’t need it. Whatever you keep, make sure it serves the narrative.

Eliminiate excess! “The good shit wants to play with the good shit!” – Thomas Sayers Ellis. (Get rid of anything that isn’t “Good Shit.”)

Clarity is non-negotiable – Don’t make readers have to guess, don’t confuse them.

Get rid of redundancy: “The sun rose this morning.” Great. But the sun rises every morning, everyone knows that. The sun doesn’t rise at night. Revision would be “The sun rose.” (This is, of course, unless you’re writing some dystopian story where the sun doesn’t usually rise, etc.)

Revise only when the work is finished, when there’s closure. Don’t revise when you’re still working on it; don’t revise an unfinished piece of work. You need to be finished before you revise because you need to know where you want to end up before you figure out how to get there.

  • Rise above your work.
  • Circle the verbs (if they’re not necessary, then kill them!)
  • We want action and drama in our stories!
  • Action and reaction go together.

Think about killing your verbs: “Dan came into the room, clumsily.” VS “Dan came into the room late, like always.” Ask yourself if the verb is actually serving the story. Focus on accuracy. “The building appears…” A building doesn’t just “appear.”

When revising ask yourself: Why did I write this work?

(What did I intend to write? VS What did I actually write?)

*Look at places where you can get rid of the word “it” (more often than you think).*

*You need to be able to say what you’re writing about in 18 words or less.*

*Look at any word longer than 8 letters and make sure it’s doing it’s job.*

 *These notes were from one of my favorite professor at Lesley University: A.J. Verdelle.*

Click here to see more MFA Notes

Recommended book for this section: The Good Negress: A Novel, by A.J. Verdelle.

Picture: Flickr/Katie Sadler

 About these MFA Notes: Revising your creative writing

Recently, I graduated from Lesley University with an MFA in creative writing, and I decided that I wanted to share what I learned in a series of blog posts.

I decided to share for two reasons:

1) My notes, although not too detailed, could possibly  help other writers.

2) Rewriting my notes forces me to re-read and re-think everything I learned, so it’s a win-win.

But before we dive in, please keep two things in mind:

1) These notes are neither complete nor perfect. The classes at Lesley were not typical lecture/note classes; the classes were filled with writing and thinking exercises and often this left no time for notes (in a good way). However, even with that, these sparse notes, I do believe, could still offer value.

2) I may, from time to time, include actual writing prompts from the classes, please bare with me, they’re first drafts and were done in the moment.

I hope you enjoy this series of notes and if you have any questions about the notes, Lesley University, or MFA’s, please feel free to contact me.

Best Of, Blackout Poetry, Blogishness, Blogishness, Politics / News, Politics / News, Uncategorized

Blackout Poetry: Combat Action Badge

Blackout Poetry Logo DesignThis poem/post will probably be a little more controversial than most Blackout poetry posts. That’s because it involves Combat Action Badges, and the current debate regarding them, and when/how/if/under what circumstances they should be awarded. My position on this is somewhat unique, though I know I’m not alone…

Blackout Poetry: Combat Action Badge

This article originally appeared in the Army Times and was over whether or not Combat Action Badge’s (CAB’s) should be retroactively awarded to soldiers.

“We don’t fight wars for awards.”

Here’s my take: Back when I was in the army, and serving in Iraq, I was awarded a CAB while serving in Mosul, Iraq. Now, at the time, CAB’s were a huge thing. Everyone wanted one. Some people wanted CAB’s so bad that they were even willing to lie to get them and “pretend,” as though they had been in a direct combat situation. It was a sad, sickening, spectacle. Several of my commanders lied about being in combat (and then backed up one another’s stories) just so they could get the coveted “Combat Action Badge.” This, ultimately, led myself and several fellow soldiers to come up with the saying “Never trust a soldier with a chest full of metal, unless the metal is shrapnel.” Lying was so prevalent that towards the end, the CAB, and several other awards, meant nothing to us.

People were trying so hard to get CAB’s that they were petitioning the Army, even back then, to change the regulations. Some soldiers wanted CAB’s for being around unexploded ordnance (I kid you not) others wanted unit-wide CAB’s since some of us had been in combat (that is actually too ridiculous for me to be able to explain in a blog post). And the coup de grace of all this is that at the end of my deployment, several fellow soldiers wanted me to lie about the events of an attack so that another soldier could be awarded a CAB. I refused, and the soldiers got upset with me, as though I was the asshole.

Anyway, if you can’t tell by now, I have no respect for soldiers, or anyone else, who feels the need to bitch, complain, and whine that they don’t have enough awards to pin on their chests.

We don’t fight wars for awards. Act like it!

 Poem Transcription:

Debate

Over

CABs

The Combat Action Badge

Was made to

Award Veterans

They want to be recognized

 For more military/war related blackout poetry click here.

To read more about the military experience and CAB’s check out the following book: