Today's Stichomancy for Eminem

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from O Pioneers! by Willa Cather:

When I've thought about your coming, I've sometimes been a little afraid of it. You have lived where things move so fast, and every- thing is slow here; the people slowest of all. Our lives are like the years, all made up of weather and crops and cows. How you hated cows!" She shook her head and laughed to herself. "I didn't when we milked together. I walked up to the pasture corners this morning. I wonder whether I shall ever be able to tell you

O Pioneers!

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy:

attached to the ladder. Approaching the cradle, he began with his thin fingers quickly to untie the knot in the rope by which the two were connected. After untying it he stood for a few moments looking silently at the baby.

Akulina did not notice this proceeding, and with her cakes on the board went to place them in a corner.

Polikey quickly hid the rope beneath his coat, and again seated himself on the bed.

"What is it that troubles you, Illitch?" inquired Akulina. "You are not yourself."

"I have not slept," he answered.

The Kreutzer Sonata

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Court Life in China by Isaac Taylor Headland:

magnificent tomb she has built for herself at such a cost, or whether a new dynasty may not rifle its riches to embellish its own? Tze-Hsi is growing old! According to nature's immutable law her faculties must soon fail her; her iron will must bend and her far-seeing eye grow dim, and after her who will resist the tide of foreign aggression and stem the torrent of inward revolt? --Lady Susan Townley in "My Chinese Note Book."

XXI

THE DEATH OF KUANG HSU AND THE EMPRESS DOWAGER

During mid-November of 1908 the Forbidden City of Peking was a blind stage before which an expectant world sat as an audience.

The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce:

above his head roused him from his dream. The baffled cannoneer had fired him a random farewell. He sprang to his feet, rushed up the sloping bank, and plunged into the forest.

All that day he traveled, laying his course by the rounding sun. The forest seemed interminable; nowhere did he discover a break in it, not even a woodman's road. He had not known that he lived in so wild a region. There was something uncanny in the revelation.

By nightfall he was fatigued, footsore, famished. The thought of his wife and children urged him on. At last he

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge