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*                                                            *  
*                         CYBERSPACE                         *  
*         A biweekly column on net culture appearing         *  
*                in the Toronto Sunday Sun                   *  
*                                                            *  
* Copyright 1999 Karl Mamer                                  *  
* Free for online distribution                               *  
* All Rights Reserved                                        *  
* Direct comments and questions to:                          *  
*   <kamamer@yahoo.com>                                      *  
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"These poems do not live: it's a sad diagnosis." 
-- Sylvia Plath  
 
I once edited a Canadian unity poetry supplement for my 
university paper. The quality of the submissions was what you 
would expect - lots of references to mosaics and hockey. Hockey 
poetry. Sigh.  
 
In the supplement's introduction I noted that poetry didn't 
really mean anything to anyone these days so thanks for even 
reading. I've never been one big on job satisfaction. A 
Windsor-area poet did not take kindly to my suggestion that his 
life's work was meaningless. He sent me a nasty letter telling 
me to grow up. 
 
I did. Last week. 
 
I was staying at friend's place and she had some of that 
magnetic poetry on her fridge. Damn, poetry can be serious fun. 
I immediately thought what a great screensaver or interactive 
wallpaper this would make. So I started searching for fun 
electronic poetry resources. 
 
This is what I found on my quest. 
 
Java Poetry prominence.com/java/poetry 
 
This page features an impressive Java implementation of 
magnetic poetry. Unfortunately, you're limited in both words 
and virtual fridge space. Don't expect to compose the next 
Beowulf. You really have enough screen space to write a small 
haiku. 
 
Electric Poetry  members.xoom.com/Jaide_X/E_Poetry.html 
 
You can get an off-line, Windows-compatible version here. The 
program is shareware. The shareware version comes with a 
finite, though sufficient, lexicon. The registered version lets 
you add word sets. The home page itself offers a gallery of 
memorable user creations. You won't find hockey poetry here, 
however. The page creator is a programmer so be prepared for 
science fiction poetry. "It's time to travel / back to base / 
another quiet / day in space". In half a decade of being on the 
Internet, I've finally found something more insufferable than 
that archive of erotic Klingon fan fiction I stumbled on once.. 
 
Bad Poetry Generator www.pangloss.com/seidel/Poem/ 
 
Really good bad poetry is not as easy to write as you would 
think. The bad poetry generator does a respectable job. You 
enter the first line of the desired poem and the page does the 
rest, cranking out a stanza of forced rhymes. Fumbling about 
for some text to test this page, I entered the title of a 
Heaven 17 song and got "Crushed by the wheels of industry / As 
I dance naked in the forest shouting 'he he he' / With an 
exercise in mass poetry. / Just nod if you can hear me". 
 
Shakespearean Insult Generator 
www.pangloss.com/seidel/Shaker/index.html 
 
Shakespeare's love sonnets are considered some of the most 
beautiful works of English poetry. I had a friend that wooed a 
woman with a Shakespearean love sonnet on Valentine's Day. 
Though the relationship started well, it ended ugly. When 
things turn ugly and the insults begin to fly, why not maintain 
some decorum? Turn to the Shakespearean Insult Generator and 
fill your flame mails and voice mail messages demanding your 
stuff back with lines like "Thou errant malmsey-nosed clack-
dish!" or "Thou art only mark'd for hot vengeance and the rod 
of heaven. " That'll learn 'em. 
 
The Semantic Rhyming Dictionary 
www.link.cs.cmu.edu/dougb/rhyme-doc.html 
 
Does anything actually rhyme with orange? No, according to the 
Semantic Rhyming Dictionary. Punch in a word and this online 
dictionary will spit out words that rhyme. Other colours that 
the dictionary is unable to find rhymes for: purple and 
crimson. 
 
Merriam-Webster Online Thesaurus www.m-w.com 
 
If you're struggling for the right word, turn to Merriam-
Webster's extensive online Thesaurus. In a test, the online 
thesaurus comes up with about three times more synonyms than 
Microsoft Word's built-in thesaurus. 
 
Spoonbill Generator  spoonbill.gold.ac.uk 
 
Poetry can be not just a laborious task but a lonely endeavor. 
Just ask Sylvia Plath. If you prefer to work as part of a team, 
the Spoonbill Generator lets you create collaborative works of 
verse. A web visitor can add a line to one of three poems in 
development. The page itself takes its name from a suggestion 
by the QWB (Society for Universal Bafflement).