Today's Stichomancy for Kurt Cobain
| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from 1984 by George Orwell: somehow you knew it, though you never heard it said--was that they shot
you from behind; always in the back of the head, without warning, as you
walked down a corridor from cell to cell.
One day--but 'one day' was not the right expression; just as probably it
was in the middle of the night: once--he fell into a strange, blissful
reverie. He was walking down the corridor, waiting for the bullet. He knew
that it was coming in another moment. Everything was settled, smoothed
out, reconciled. There were no more doubts, no more arguments, no more
pain, no more fear. His body was healthy and strong. He walked easily,
with a joy of movement and with a feeling of walking in sunlight. He was
not any longer in the narrow white corridors in the Ministry of Love, he
1984 |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad: uncongenial surroundings, fed on unfamiliar food, they sickened,
became inefficient, and were then allowed to crawl away and rest.
These moribund shapes were free as air--and nearly as thin.
I began to distinguish the gleam of the eyes under the trees.
Then, glancing down, I saw a face near my hand. The black bones
reclined at full length with one shoulder against the tree,
and slowly the eyelids rose and the sunken eyes looked up at me,
enormous and vacant, a kind of blind, white flicker in the depths
of the orbs, which died out slowly. The man seemed young--
almost a boy--but you know with them it's hard to tell.
I found nothing else to do but to offer him one of my good Swede's
Heart of Darkness |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Helen of Troy And Other Poems by Sara Teasdale: That moved beneath the palace windows here,
And yet sometimes a knight in shining steel
Would pass and catch the gleaming of my hair,
And wave a mailed hand and smile at me,
Whereat I made no sign and turned away,
Affrighted and yet glad and full of dreams.
Ah, dreams and dreams that asked no answering!
I should have wrought to make my dreams come true,
But all my life was like an autumn day,
Full of gray quiet and a hazy peace.
What was I saying? All is gone again.
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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 A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare: Ouer parke, ouer pale, through flood, through fire,
I do wander euerie where, swifter then y Moons sphere;
And I serue the Fairy Queene, to dew her orbs vpon the green.
The Cowslips tall, her pensioners bee,
In their gold coats, spots you see,
Those be Rubies, Fairie fauors,
In those freckles, liue their sauors,
I must go seeke some dew drops heere,
And hang a pearle in euery cowslips eare.
Farewell thou Lob of spirits, Ile be gon,
Our Queene and all her Elues come heere anon
A Midsummer Night's Dream |
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