Words for Cold Days

And finally, for those like me who take the seasons as they come, there are voyages in books. When the house grows too small and the shadows too real and the clock in the hallway talks death to itself. When the oven is merely hot and the sheets merely stiff and and the clock in the hallway talks death to itself. When the floorboards creak and the furnace pops and the eaves sigh and the windows are too blind...and the clock in the hallway talks death to itself.

From Charles L. Grant's Nightmare Seasons published by Tor Books in 1982.