
Several weeks ago I came across a post on Facebook with some extraordinary fantasy images. As I read I learned that these were done by artificial intelligence. I admit that I was intrigued and began searching for how this was done. I was able to find the Midjourney site and spent hours lost in creation. According to Wikipedia, Midjourney is an independent research lab that produces a proprietary artificial intelligence program that creates images from textual descriptions.
As a person who loves both words and photography, this was a goldmine to my heart. I proceeded to spend hours getting lost in the different creations that were born from the many words that I loved, both of my own and of others. I couldn’t help but wonder what artificial intelligence might create from poetry, so I absolutely had to try.
I began with some of my own words:

My spirit is a river
with passions roaring wild
spilling gently into calm,
quiet waters …
forever dancing
in the place where
the fire of the day
meets the quiet of the night.

The forest sings
a thousand songs
filled with wisdom
collected over centuries,
and I,
A solitary human
with my finite heart
doing all I can to
hear their whispers

Emerging from the shadows
An Awakening
in light
Pushing past false selves
A fledgling
reborn, tonight.
Layer upon layer of untruths
Melt from my skin
like ice
Puddles of darkness surround me
Evaporating
into the night.
The stars slowly descend
To encircle
my inner being
A dance of light and love
An ethereal Celebration
of Seeing
Then I thought of the many poets and poems that I have loved and decided to see how the dance between artificial intelligence and poetry would go with these celebrated words.

“Hope” is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –
I’ve heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet – never – in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of me.
~Emily Dickinson~

I am too alone in this world,
and yet not alone enough
to make every moment holy.
~Rainer Maria Rilke~

I wish I could show you,
when you are lonely or in darkness,
the astonishing light of your own being.
~Hafiz~

In the depth of my soul there is
A wordless song – a song that lives
In the seed of my heart.
~Kahlil Gibran~

Let your life
lightly dance
on the edges of Time
like dew on the tip
of a leaf
~Tagore~

My soul is from elsewhere,
I’m sure of that,
and I intend to end up there
~Rumi~

The dream of my life
is to lie down by a slow river
and stare at the light in the trees –
to learn something by being nothing
~Mary Oliver~

Poetry is the unexpected
utterance of the soul.
~Mark Nepo~

To see the world in a grain of sand
and a Heaven in a Wildflower,
hold infinity in the palm of your hand
and Eternity in an Hour
~William Blake~

When you appear
all the rivers sound in my body,
bells shake the sky,
and a hymn fills the world.
~Pablo Neruda~

When I rise up
let me rise up joyful like a bird.
When I fall let me fall
without regret like a leaf.
~Wendell Berry~