"... and the day slides slowly from the roofs of the sloping village. It freezes harder than ivory; one can almost see it in the air as though the light was being stretched on nails. A clear cold radiance hangs over the landscape and a crow crosses it on creaking wings. The rich earth, with all its seeds and humming fields and courtships, is now closed and bound in white vellum. Only one colour remains, today's single promise, pricked in red over the ashen world - seen in a flitting robin, some rosehips on a bush, the sun hanging low by the wood, and through the flushed cottage windows the berries of the holly and the russet faces of the feasting children."
Laurie Lee, "A Cold Christmas Walk in the Country", from The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories edited by Jessica Harrison.
