AI Actually Didn’t Write This ~ ft. My Sporadically Creative Brain

Greetings, all.

Not sure whether or not you actually enjoy poetry posts, but here I am with another one.

but. PLOT TWIST.

AI wrote this one!! And before you all leave, because who cares that AI wrote a poem because AI is soulless and thus writes poems with excellent imagery that it probably stole from some broke college student trying to make a name for herself while juggling classes and homework and a part time job and goodness knows what else but that are unfeeling because AI is doesn’t quite understand how to insert human feeling into its cobbled-together masterpieces, *gasps for oxygen* AI only wrote MOST of this one. I took a lil snippet of rhyme that I had sitting around and said, “Hey Copilot, finish this poem for me.”

(Copilot also once wrote me a poem that rhymed stock (as in yes, we have that item in stock) with stock (as in farm animals). True story.)

I gave it:

What do you do

when there’s nothing to say;

when it’s come to an end

and nothing’s okay.

And Copilot gave me:

You sit with the silence, 

let it echo and sway, 

feel the ache in your chest 

as the light slips away

You breathe through the wreckage, 

though the air tastes like pain, 

and whisper to shadows 

what you can’t yet explain. 

You wait for the morning, 

though it’s stubborn and slow, 

and trust that the healing 

will come soft, come low.

So ok, it literally answered the questions I asked in my verse. But what if I want it to be a more question/answer/question/answer type of thing? Question verses can be mine, Copilot can write the answers. Its job is answering questions, so that logics nicely.

Oh and also, the first verse it gave me has the same rhyme sound as my first verse. I don’t like. Rewrite please!!

It gave me several options (struggled a bit to discern the “drown” sound from the “moan” sound, but it got the job done 😉) and I’ve decided upon this one:

You sit with the silence 

let it settle and drown

feel the ache in your chest 

as the night pulls you down

It wants a bit of editing, but we’ll call it good for now until we can get a rough draft together. I need another verse of questions now though.

*stares into distance while mentally rhyming and twitching fingers to count syllables*

Ok ok how about:

How do you cope

when sun starts to set;

when the light starts to fade

but you weren’t ready yet.

OR ohohoho:

How do you cope

when you start to forget…

lol I lost it; I don’t know how to finish that. Moving on!!

Y’know what who cares what AI has to say right now, let’s ask more deep questions about life.

Where do you run

when you’ve lost the road home;

in the wind there’s an echo

…

AAAAAHHHHHH I DON’T KNOW HOW TO END THIS VERSE HELPPPPP

okayyyyy that’s kind of a problem.

---

*weeks later comes back looking for a usable draft to work with*

Oooh, look at that, I was writing a poem.

Oooh, look at that, I got stuck and didn’t know where to go with it.

My nearly-nine-o-clock-at-night brain can conquer this, right??

where was i going with thisss…doesn’t look like i knew then and i’m about to wing it this time around…

The current problem is a rhyme with home. I like alone, even though it’s a slant rhyme (and I typically don’t like using those). But can’t figure out how to work it into the last line without changing any of the other ✨perfect✨ lines in that verse. So. Stalemate.

Blown, shown, thrown, tone…known???

Yeah I’m feelin’ it.

Where do you run

when you’ve lost the road home;

in the wind there’s an echo

of love you’d once known.

Onward!! We need a resolution. It seems high time for some positivity; it’s getting a tad too depressing around these here parts.

Sooo…let’s like, wrap up each of these questions in a resolution type thing.

In the end you can’t hide

when there’s nothing to say;

when the road takes a turn

and the light starts to fade.

…or…

Sometimes things end

and there’s nothing to say;

and it has to get dark

at the end of the day.

OR (and this is feeling like the vibes I’m looking for, cuz I don’t really want to repeat the rhymes I already used)

Sometimes things end

and words aren’t enough;

the road takes a turn

and the sun calls your bluff.

*nods* But that isn’t quite a resolution. More of a restatement. Ya feel?? (also please don’t ask what the sun calling your bluff means, for I fear that I don’t have an answer for you. It sounds cool *shrugs*)

*crickets chirping as I rack my brain for an ending*

I…I’m gonna admit, I don’t know how to end this poem. I don’t knowwww…it needs a reminder that the sun will rise (cliche as that is) and it’s not the end and there’s literally nowhere else to go but forward regardless of whether or not you know which road leads back home.

*sigh*

Ok. After some consultation with my peers (aka, my parents who were the only ones in the room while I sit here with no music playing through my headphones, way later than I needed to be on my laptop; especially because I still need to memorize five verses today to meet my quota before our first quiz meet on Saturday, which, hey, if I really find an ending for this poem this week, you’ll likely be reading this while I’m on my way to the meet!!), I’ve decided I can kind of…answer the questions I’ve asked?? Like, not in a concrete way, but in a “there’s nothing to do but go on” type of way. If that isn’t logical, please pretend it is so I can continue recapping the creative process. Appreciated 😉

Now where was I??

The first verse has to do with words. Words not being enough, words coming to an end. Essentially, silence.

Silence is golden,

but breathe through the pain;

one day your heart

will be opened again.

*sobs* Don’t hunt me down, please I beg you, I hate it when words don’t quite actually rhyme like that BUT I HAD TO. Maybe I’ll change it later, maybe I won’t.

Then we have a verse (I just about typed “paragraph” instead of “verse” 😬) about the sun setting before we were ready. Not enough time in a day, am I right?? (ofc not, Ava, you waste too much of it on Substack and Pinterest and books and writing blog posts when you’re supposed to be studying. prioritize a little bit, wouldja girl??)(argh my conscience is trying to curb the creative spirit)(wow it’s way too late for this kind of thing my brain is not being responsible rn)

The light will return,

always has, always will;

there’s always some good

that’s worth fighting for still.

Don’t mind me, just borrowing a line from Tolkien…*wanders away whistling and twiddling thumbs* These verses are the epitome of rough drafts, I’ll tweak them into better shape later (and maybe avoid plagiarizing Tolkien).

And then we have a verse on losing your way. Oooh, we should include compasses or the North Star or something!! I love stars…

Keep walking on

remember what’s true;

in the morning you’ll see

home was searching for you.

I’m sorry. I couldn’t work either in *sobs* But I did so want to!! Maybe in my next poem…

Ok, we’re going to call that a night. Cheerio, farewell, see you soon for a final polish!!

---

Hey hey, guess who’s back!!

I have spent the last fifteen minutes (at least!!) trying to rework the second half of the “silence is golden” verse. I have five versions. Three have potential. One is just nonsense syllables through the entire second half. And the last one I just totally gave up on hope because NOTHING’S WORKING and it turned dark. Suffice it to say, you will not be seeing that version 😬

We’re going to go with this one, I suppose.

silence is golden

but breathe through the pain

and trust that your heart

wasn’t broken in vain

---

Ok ok, this is the final edit, I’m done, this post has gotten way too long and isn’t even what I advertised in the beginning, here it is, enjoy.

What do you do

when there’s nothing to say;

when it’s come to an end

and you’re not okay.

How do you cope

when the sun starts to set;

when the light starts to fade

but you weren’t ready yet.

Where do you run

when you’ve lost the road home;

in the wind there’s an echo

of love you’d once known.

Sometimes things end

and words aren’t enough;

the road takes a turn

and the sun calls your bluff.

Silence is golden

but breathe through the pain;

and trust that your heart

wasn’t broken in vain.

The light will return

always has, always will;

I carry a hope

that the darkness can’t kill.

Keep journeying on

and remember what’s true;

in the morning you’ll see

home was searching for you.

---

To those of you who made it this far: congratulations and my humblest thanks. I didn’t expect this to take so long. Have some cookies *passes out snickerdoodles* This is how poetry works: it does–until it doesn’t. Then it’s screaming into the void because the first three lines of a verse are perfection but nothing rhymes or logics and the syllable count is off and you pretend you don’t care and go work on other projects. Alas. Poetry is not as easy as it looks. Poetry is complicated (as all art forms are; ’tis to be expected, I suppose). Anndddd I’m going to stop rambling now 😉

Always,

Ava 📜

(tune in next time for the sequel: “Wait, how do we title poetry again???”)