Reticulations creep upon the slack stream’s face
When the wind skims irritably past,

The current clucks smartly into each hollow place
That years of flood have scrabbled in the pier’s sodden base;
The floating lily leaves rot fast.
On a roof stand the swallows ranged in wistful waiting rows,
Till they arrow off and drop like stones
Among the eyot-withies at whose feet the river flows:
And beneath the roof is she who in the dark world shows
As a lattice-gleam when midnight moans. Thomas Hardy

I am still in Hardy Country here…although nor translated literally, I think I have kept a sense of the place…the rugged bleak landscape, the windswept clouds and rough water…

Note:I had some fun with the title…it (the title) hearkens back to Hardy’s novel “Under the Greenwood Tree” and Shakespeare’s verse of the same name, of which the last line reads
“Heere shall he see no enemie,
But Winter and Rough Weather”.sic
And course the painting is literally about winter and rough weather..

• Watercolour on Arches Not Paper more paintings below…click the titles…

The Sea

Thomas Hardy Collection

The Winter Collection