QUOTE : Rose and russet, scarlet and sienna. Old men blew colored smoke through long painted flutes, etching the air with soundless music. Saffron and vermilion, amaranth and coral. From each dome rose a needlelike spire, all of them snapping with swallowtail flags and interconnected by ribbons across which children ran laughing, clad in cloaks of colored feathers. Mulberry and citrine, celadon and chocolate. Their shadows kept pace with them down below in a way that could never happen in the true Weep, enshrouded as it was in one great shadow. The imaginary citizenry wore garments of simple loveliness, the women’s hair long and trailing behind them, or else held aloft by attendant songbirds that were their own sparks of color. Dandelion and chestnut, tangerine and goldenrod.