Panic Poetry presents endlessly shifting poems composed of 180 AI-generated lines, recombining in real time into 3.7 nonillion possible configurations. To stop the ceaseless deluge of text, the reader must break the glass and hit the panic button to freeze the poem on the screen. In that act, the reader arrests the system’s generative drive and fixes a single version, in effect “writing” the final poem. This mechanism stages a response to contemporary conditions of textual overabundance, capturing the frustration, urgency, and overwhelm of navigating endless streams of information. The use of AI foregrounds how digital systems both produce and accelerate this deluge.

The piece was presented as part of the exhibition Bar CodeX in the macBAR at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Lyon.