Today's Stichomancy for Michael Jackson

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Phantasmagoria and Other Poems by Lewis Carroll:

A Ghost is not a DUMB thing! But pray sit down: you'll feel inclined (If, like myself, you have not dined) To take a snack of something:

"Though, certainly, you don't appear A thing to offer FOOD to! And then I shall be glad to hear - If you will say them loud and clear - The Rules that you allude to."

"Thanks! You shall hear them by and by. This IS a piece of luck!"

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Old Maid by Honore de Balzac:

used it for twelve years,--a fact to which she called attention with the triumphant joy of happy avarice. Most of the inhabitants of the town were grateful to Mademoiselle Cormon for not humiliating them by the luxury she could have displayed; we may even believe that had she imported a caleche from Paris they would have gossiped more about that than about her various matrimonial failures. The most brilliant equipage would, after all, have only taken her, like the old carriole, to Prebaudet. Now the provinces, which look solely to results, care little about the beauty or elegance of the means, provided they are efficient.

CHAPTER V

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac:

Coralie's dressing-room and consoled her, till she had no courage left. She went home in despair, less for her own sake than for Lucien's.

"Braulard has betrayed us," Lucien said.

Coralie was heartstricken. The next day found her in a high fever, utterly unfit to play, face to face with the thought that she had been cut short in her career. Lucien hid the papers from her, and looked them over in the dining-room. The reviewers one and all attributed the failure of the piece to Coralie; she had overestimated her strength; she might be the delight of a boulevard audience, but she was out of her element at the Gymnase; she had been inspired by a laudable

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 This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald:

of vanity, the crest of his young egotism.

BOOK ONE The Romantic Egotist

CHAPTER 3 The Egotist Considers

"OUCH! Let me go!" He dropped his arms to his sides. "What's the matter?" "Your shirt studit hurt melook!" She was looking down at her neck, where a little blue spot about the size of a pea marred its pallor.

This Side of Paradise