A January Night

The rain smites more and more,

The east wind snarls and sneezes;

Through the joints of the quivering door

The water wheezes.

The tip of each ivy-shoot

Writhes on its neighbour's face;

There is some hid dread afoot

That we cannot trace.

Is it the spirit astray

Of the man at the house below

Whose coffin they took in to-day?

We do not know.

And a quote from a Hardy novel

“Everybody must be managed. Queens must be managed. Kings must be managed, for men want managing almost as much as women, and that's saying a good deal.” - (Under the Greenwood Tree)

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