**************************************************************  

*                                                            *  

*                         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>                                      *  

*                                                            *  

**************************************************************  

 

"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).