Fantasies, on the other hand, have more to do
with reality than most people like to admit.
A fantasy can take on novel proportions, though
a fantasy and a novel differ in that a fantasy is more

colorful: there are usually more splenetic greens,
hyperbolic blues, and lion yellows than in a novel.
Most novelists deny themselves the color yellow
in particular, whether they are American novelists

abstaining from yellow due to cowardly connotations
or they are Germans for whom yellow is traditionally
the color of courage and thus restrained for history's sake.
Of course, the Egyptians have always loved yellow

but they've only recently produced decent novelists
so it's too early to tell whether any color theory
of yellow holds up across cultures. And yet, yellow
does seem to illuminate everything in this world

when illumination is called for. Take, for instance,
the very marrow of our bones: yellow. Or just look
at the outline of any one thing in the room —
do you not detect a yellow trim, even in the shadows?