Today's Stichomancy for Yoshitaka Amano

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn:

the crete-de-coq, whose radicles sought sustenance, perhaps from human dust, in the decay of generations:--all that rich life of graves summoned up fancies of Resurrection, Nature's resurrection-work--wondrous transformations of flesh, marvellous bans migration of souls! ... From some forgotten crevice of that tomb roof, which alone intervened between her and the vast light, a sturdy weed was growing. He knew that plant, as it quivered against the blue,--the chou-gras, as Creole children call it: its dark berries form the mockingbird's favorite food ... Might not its roots, exploring darkness, have found some unfamiliar nutriment within?--might it not be that something of the dead

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Captain Stormfield by Mark Twain:

the glare. Thinks I, it won't do to run into him, so I shunted to one side and tore along. By and by I closed up abreast of his tail. Do you know what it was like? It was like a gnat closing up on the continent of America. I forged along. By and by I had sailed along his coast for a little upwards of a hundred and fifty million miles, and then I could see by the shape of him that I hadn't even got up to his waistband yet. Why, Peters, WE don't know anything about comets, down here. If you want to see comets that ARE comets, you've got to go outside of our solar system - where there's room for them, you understand. My friend, I've seen comets out there that couldn't even lay down inside the ORBITS of

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Child of Storm by H. Rider Haggard:

furious attendants and the sound of Mameena's light and mocking laughter.

"I wonder which of them she will marry?" I thought to myself, as I set out for the wagons.

As I approached my camp I saw that the oxen were being inspanned, as I supposed by the order of Scowl, who must have heard that there was a row up at the kraal, and thought it well to be ready to bolt. In this I was mistaken, however, for just then Saduko strolled out of a patch of bush and said:

"I ordered your boys to yoke up the oxen, Inkoosi."

"Have you? That's cool!" I answered. "Perhaps you will tell me why."

Child of Storm

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 The Shadow Line by Joseph Conrad:

was burning and the other was shivering, but he thought that it was pretty much the same thing. I thought so, too. I felt shocked by the news. "One burning, the other shivering, you say? No. We haven't left the sickness behind. Do they look very ill?"

"Middling bad, sir." Ransome's eyes gazed steadily into mine. We exchanged smiles. Ran- some's a little wistful, as usual, mine no doubt grim enough, to correspond with my secret exasperation.

I asked:

The Shadow Line