All right, this is my true next to next to last post for A-Z Challenge. Apparently (you may not have known this, as apparently I’d “forgotten”) but apparently April has 30 days AND there is a letter between X and Z. That letter is Y, as in Why did I agree to write 26 posts this month when historically I have a hard time writing a post a week??

Yeah, the things we do for our art. =D

Welcome to Xanadu, Population 1

Welcome to Xanadu, your new home, I hope. No one ever chooses to stay here long. Sometimes, I will start these introductions with the good, with the trickling fountains and the luxurious grounds, our gorgeous mountain vistas. Other times, I start by mentioning the bad – just to get it out of the way, with the neighbors, who can admittedly be a problem. This is not a good place to raise children, they say.

But that is not true! Your children will be safe and secure, more safe and secure than any place on earth I dare say! You merely need to take certain precautions and keep them indoors during the night, at noon, and on certain major alignments of the sun, moon, and stars. I have a chart I can give you.

Did I mention the mountain vistas? Oh how sweetly falls the dew upon the mountain peaks, how softly lie the wildest and most fearsome of creatures upon their lofty beds. (Except at night and noon and … I have charts. Many charts. No worries! No worries, dear guest.)

But, no, where are you going with such haste? Why does no one ever stay? I only hope that you can make it out before dark, when the creatures wake from their slumber.

Farewell, then, dear guest, and make haste.

Now Leaving Xanadu. Population 1

Kubla Khan has always been one of my favorite poems and I *had* to riff on Xanadu a little for the X day.