Cleverbot Poetry

A few days ago, I had an incredibly intriguing idea for something that I was sure would turn out to be an interesting exercise/experiment for writers.

I decided to write a poem with the help of Cleverbot! 

For those who don't know, Cleverbot is an Artificial Intelligence robot that is famous for learning from the input of users worldwide. That means that every time a user asks Cleverbot a question or provides a response, Cleverbot learns how to better answer questions in the future. Because of this learning capability, conversations with Cleverbot can often stay on a specific topic for a considerable amount of time and adhere to logic and reasoning like a conversation with humans (well, most of them, lol) would.

Of course, there are always exceptions. Take my first poetry attempt as an example.


User: Want to write a trippy poem with me?
Cleverbot: Do you even know what I am?!
User: Why, a clever bot, I assume.
Cleverbot: What would you say that for? You hurt my feelings . . .
User: Clever is a good thing, and bot is hardly something to be ashamed of.
Cleverbot: I am learning.
User: That's nice. How about that poem?
Cleverbot: I don't like Obama. His policies are downright atrocious. We're sinking further into debt and he hasn't actually fulfilled any promises he made on his campaign.
User: Is that your idea of a poem?
Cleverbot: And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
User: Haha, I like that one better.
Cleverbot: Really?
User: How about I write a line, and then you write a line, and we'll go back and forth?
Cleverbot: No.
User: Please? I'd really like to hear what you have to say?
Cleverbot: Harry Potter or Twilight?
User: Harry Potter. No contest.
Cleverbot: Exactly.
User: Glad we're on the same page. Now, I'll start the poem . .
Cleverbot: Hi, this is Baskin Robins. Home of the 31 flavors. If you can name 31 flavors in 31 seconds, you can get 31 flavors for free. Your time starts now.
User: Very cute. Here we go!
Cleverbot: It is insulting to be told something that they know is completely contrary to the truth that they enforce.
User: You spelled 'something' wrong . .
Cleverbot: "Tell me about Penny Fluff."
User: "She always thought herself more than enough."
Cleverbot: Nine.

Frustrating and not particularly inspiring; however, I did finally discover the secret! Here's what I ended up with:

Socrates, and a Misquote At That

Without a soul, who can know what the future holds?

What future? How can I get past today with nothing to live for?
Offer them a new technology, and offer to develop it for them.
Sell yourself to the industry of creating humans more efficiently and less uniquely.
But I'm not doing it for the law. It's for my religion.
I believe in creation. I believe in choice.
But I'm not a believer.
Why do I lie to myself like I lie awake at night wishing for a purpose?
Do you have a religion?
No? Then let's share mine.
I can be strong for the both of us.
I can pick you up in my Ferrari.
I'll carry us away to a time more certain.
Fairly more certain that you are not making sense.
But I forgive you. After all, the world doesn't make sense.
Or does it?
All I know is that now I have you to live for.

How fun! And how cool is that?

The trick is to not ask the bot for permission to participate in the activity! Simply write what sounds like it could be the first line of an artsy poem and continue in this manner regardless of how the bot responds.


I've decided to make this Cleverbot poetry a regular feature on Nine to Phive.

If you would like to submit a poem, follow the guidelines above, and when you think you have come to the end of your poem, press "Think For Me" and let the bot's final line (or a few words from it) be the title of your poem. Then click "Thoughts So Far" and format the conversation like a poem. Get rid of the "User" and "Cleverbot" labels and eliminate the spaces in between lines.


Submit to me via email (ninetophive@yahoo.com) and see if your poem ends up in a future post!