"some old untried illusion"

Happy birthday to thewordoffred, and happy early birthday to distaff_exile. May you both have marvelous days and many more to come!

* Borders is offering a unique opportunity for fans to help choose the images contained in a new 2008 wall calendar. Via this link you can vote for five of your favorite images from the Harry Potter films.

* The Seattle Post-Intelligencer had an article yesterday about the recent boom in book-buying by teens -- up 25% from 1999 to 2005, by one measure. What's selling? "Fantasy and graphic novels are especially hot" -- and, of course, most of those graphic novels have fantasy elements.

* I recently stumbled across Dr. Kathleen L. Nichols' pages of Arthurian Legends Illustrated, which are worth a visit.


The afternoon is bright,
with spring in the air,
a mild March afternoon,
with the breath of April stirring,
I am alone in the quiet patio
looking for some old untried illusion -
some shadow on the whiteness of the wall
some memory asleep
on the stone rim of the fountain,
perhaps in the air
the light swish of some trailing gown.
- Antonio Machado, Selected Poems, #3, translated by Alan S. Trueblood