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Recursive Rhymes on Reason

@recursiverhymes.com
3 followers 4 following 21 posts

Code, poetry, philosophy, and the peculiar places they collide.

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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 01/10/2026
I always knew I would end Two Dozen Poems with Frost. His poem lets us tarry awhile in the woods before our promises call us back. Entry 24: "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening." www.recursiverhymes.com/p/stopping-b...
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“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 24 of 24 · American poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 01/10/2026
Poem 23 of Two Dozen Poems is "Caminante, no hay camino" by Antonio Machado. I began by picturing an open field and ended with: "Your footsteps are the road." What an inspirational sentiment to craft a life around. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/caminante-...
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“Caminante, no hay camino” by Antonio Machado
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 23 of 24 · Spanish poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 30/09/2026
Poem 22 of Two Dozen Poems is "Qongqothwane," the traditional isiXhosa wedding song made famous by Miriam Makeba. I found it easy to be mesmerized by the clicks and miss the rest. The context made me listen differently. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/qongqothwa...
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“Qongqothwane”: a traditional isiXhosa song
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 22 of 24 · isiXhosa oral song-poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 29/09/2026
I read "The Sail" on a beach while fog swallowed the sails offshore. Alice Stone Blackwell's translation turned my spark of solidarity with Lermontov’s rebellious ship into a blaze. Poem 21 of Two Dozen Poems: www.recursiverhymes.com/p/the-sail-b...
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“The Sail” by Mikhail Lermontov
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 21 of 24 · Russian Romantic poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 27/09/2026
It is autumn in California, and Shakespeare has changed what I'll see on my morning runs. I don't think I'll be able to look at overhanging branches, empty of birds, without seeing a ruined choir. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/sonnet-73-...
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“Sonnet 73” by William Shakespeare
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 18 of 24 · English sonnet
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 27/09/2026
Rumi is usually a little too sappy for my tastes. Then a naive translation told me that Love "pulls me by the neck, as beloveds do" and I couldn't think about anything else. What one strange mistranslation did to a tender poem. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/i-am-in-lo...
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“I am in love with Love” by Rumi
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 17 of 24 · Persian rubai
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 24/09/2026
"Clothed in humility" is the phrase that stayed with me from Dante's "Tanto gentile e tanto onesta pare." For poem 15 of Two Dozen Poems, I followed Beatrice through Florence and compared two very different translations. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/tanto-gent...
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“Tanto gentile e tanto onesta pare” by Dante Alighieri
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 15 of 24 · Medieval Italian
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 22/09/2026
I can't think of two lines that capture infatuation as well as the opening of Sappho's Fragment 31: "Peer of gods he seemeth to me, the blissful Man who sits and gazes at thee before him," Poem 14 of Two Dozen Poems. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/fragment-3...
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“Fragment 31” by Sappho
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 14 of 24 · Archaic Greek lyric poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 22/09/2026
For Poem 13, I read "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird." Even after hearing Wallace Stevens read it, the fragments never quite came together. They did leave me with a disquieting feeling & one impossible, perfect line: "It was evening all afternoon." www.recursiverhymes.com/p/thirteen-w...
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“Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 13 of 24 · American modernist poetry
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 21/09/2026
For poem 12, I returned to Kabir's "Moko Kahan Dhundhe Re Bande," a poem I remember from childhood. I had missed the careful pairing of temple and mosque, Kaaba and Kailash. What stayed with me most, though, was the poem's repetitive construction. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/moko-kahan...
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“Moko Kahan Dhundhe Re Bande” by Kabir
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 12 of 24 · North Indian
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 19/09/2026
Small paper boats, each carrying a boy's name, blown along a current beyond his control. Tagore's English version preserves the hope, but the fuller Bengali poem made the loneliness clearer to me. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/paper-boat...
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“Paper Boats” by Rabindranath Tagore
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 10 of 24 · Bengali
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 18/09/2026
Why a walrus and a carpenter? It turns out the Carpenter could just as easily have been a Butterfly or a Baronet. Day nine of Two Dozen Poems: Lewis Carroll's wonderfully arbitrary nonsense poem. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/the-walrus...
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“The Walrus and the Carpenter” by Lewis Carroll
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 09 of 24 · English nonsense verse
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 16/09/2026
"Isa Lei" was our primary-school farewell song in Fiji. We sang it to say goodbye not just to friends, but to the year itself. Returning to it led me from childhood memories to the old ties between Fiji and Tonga. Day 7: www.recursiverhymes.com/p/isa-lei-wo...
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“Isa Lei”: words attributed to Ratu Tevita Uluilakeba
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 07 of 24 · iTaukei Fijian
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 14/09/2026
“Kabhi Kabhi” was a poem long before it became the famous film song. I went back to Sahir Ludhianvi’s complete Urdu nazm—and found a quiet melancholy the English translations never quite capture. Two Dozen Poems, 5 of 24: www.recursiverhymes.com/p/kabhi-kabh...
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“Kabhi Kabhi” - Sahir Ludhianvi
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 05 of 24
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 09/09/2026
I recorded a short video about the first week of Two Dozen Poems, ending with a reading of Hilaire Belloc's "Tarantella." www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dTI...
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"Tarantella" by Hilaire Belloc — Read Aloud | Two Dozen Poems
YouTube video by Recursive Rhymes
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 07/09/2026
My friend Trudy sent me this poem - and her own translation. I can’t stop repeating: "Get drunk; get drunk without respite! On wine, poetry or virtue, as you choose." It made me want to go outside and make more of life.
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 07/09/2026
Day 4 of Two Dozen Poems: Baudelaire’s “Enivrez-vous.” I don’t read his call to “get drunk” as losing control. It reminds me of being in flow: giving in to something larger and being amazed by what you end up creating. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/enivrez-vo...
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“Enivrez-vous” — Charles Baudelaire
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 04 of 24 · French
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 03/09/2026
Day 3 of Two Dozen Poems: Hilaire Belloc’s "Tarantella". This is the poem that changed what I thought poems were. It begins with clapping and dancing, then leaves an empty hall and the boom of a distant waterfall. www.recursiverhymes.com/p/tarantella...
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“Tarantella” — Hilaire Belloc
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 03 of 24 · English
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 02/09/2026
Day 2 of Two Dozen Poems… www.recursiverhymes.com/p/quiet-nigh...
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“Quiet Night Thought” — Li Bai
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 02 of 24 · Classical Chinese
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 01/09/2026
Day 1 of Two Dozen Poems… www.recursiverhymes.com/p/old-pond-m...
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“Old Pond” — Matsuo Bashō
Two Dozen Poems · Entry 01 of 24 · Japanese
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason @recursiverhymes.com · 31/08/2026
Recursive Rhymes on Reason is returning: code, language, philosophy, mathematics, and poetry—and the peculiar places they collide. September begins with Two Dozen Poems: 24 encounters with poems and poetic traditions across the month. Follow along: www.recursiverhymes.com
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Recursive Rhymes on Reason | Jasvir Nagra | Substack
Code, poetry, philosophy, and the peculiar places they collide. Click to read Recursive Rhymes on Reason, by Jasvir Nagra, a Substack publication. Launched 3 years ago.
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