Leftovers

Japanese mountaineer’s axe, 14th century

Aries: A hundred eyes lie hidden beneath your skull, always searching, gazing, upward and downward but never ahead. Their knowledge comes to you in dreams and fills you with strange power. Try a new restaurant this week.

Taurus: A goat’s jawbone will surface from your carpet, and the floor around it will blacken slowly. Let it cool for eight hours, then wear it on a string—against your skin, close to the heart. It is a gift and you must accept it.

Gemini: Your soul is split between your body, and the body of a lean wild dog. You know where to find it, but do not go there. You will not recognize yourself, and one part of you may destroy the other.

Cancer: The quiet tapping at your window means someone is coming, or has already arrived. Leave a lawn chair on the ground outside tonight—they will be weary and smeared with a pungent tar, and have much to tell you.

Leo: A hot soup with squash and rosemary will soothe the aching in your chest, and your teeth will finally stop growing. Breathe. Sleep deeply if you can. This stage is over, but another will begin soon.

Virgo: Black shrouds float at the corner of your eye, and flicker away when you turn to look at them. These are old friends, and with careful blurring of your vision, you will come to see their faces—bone-white and smiling through the dark cloth.

Libra: At the stroke of midnight a lamb will stand, bleating, beside your bed. Reach out and tangle your fingers in its wild wool, let it pull you from your sheets, slip into its trembling chest and sleep there as it paces the halls in the dark. When you wake up, you’ll be well-rested and ready to face the day.

Scorpio: Seventeen blackbirds and one robin will appear at dusk. Chase the robin away—invite the blackbirds inside. Make peppermint tea and sing to them in a foreign tongue. They’ll vanish at dawn and take your fears with them.

Sagittarius: Wait at your open door at 11pm and stare into the night. The distant sound of wind chimes and tires turning on wet gravel will transform you. Leap into the dark. Run for hours on your long limbs, and chase whatever moves—but don’t forget the way back home.

Capricorn: You will awake at 3am atop an unfamiliar roof. The moon is hot-white in the sky, but the yard below is shrouded in darkness. Something waits for you there. Do not climb down before the sun rises.

Aquarius: Your eyes are like searchlights in a murky sea, and passersby will notice this rare quality in the gloom. New friends will come easily to you—enchanted, terrified, helpless in your blinding gaze.

Pisces: When you cup water in your hands, its surface vibrates with an unearthly song. Some days its beauty will make you weep—on others it will wail with an ancient grief that only you can understand. Be careful when washing your face.

It spoke your name on the stairs that night.

Art by yakun wang

“Good food does lead to sex. As it should. And in a perfect world, good music does too.”

-Anthony Bourdain