A certain reservation

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground

With walls and towers were girdled round:

And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

And here were forests ancient as the hills,

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

.........

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision once I saw:

It was an Abyssinian maid,

And on her dulcimer she played,

Singing of Mount Abora.

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight 'twould win me

That with music loud and long

I would build that dome in air,

That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Beware! Beware!

His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

And close your eyes with holy dread,

For he on honey-dew hath fed

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

Two centuries ago Samuel Taylor Coleridge penned these lines to a poem called Xanadu (some call it Kubla Kahn). It paints such a beautiful picture in the mind's eye. It was a place called a pleasure dome, a garden paradise, described in glamorous terms. The poem is 5 stanzas long, but I have put the gist of the poem here from stanzas 1, 2, and 5. The last stanza doesn't so much describe Xanadu as it speaks of the king who built it being so enchanted by a maiden there that he could do nothing else except be captivated by her.

I have a special place in my heart for this poem. Perhaps it describes the idyllic place and person that any person would want to have. It might just exist in the mind. Earth might not be able to hold a pleasure dome like this one. But if it did, I would certainly want a reservation to stay there. And while there I would find this maiden with her dulcimer to lull me to stay in this place forever to hear the strains of her music, feed on honey dew, and drink the milk of her paradise.

So idyllic, I know. But if one were to have come through the desert sands and dunes of the great mongolian desert like Kubla Kahn did in the poem, then not only would that person want a reservation there, (s)he would want stay a long time to be drunk from the milk of this paradise, enchanted by the captivating music of the maiden. And if a picture could conjure the same feeling as the poem (without matching its description) it would look like the picture below.

XANADU