The courtyard is everything. All your grief is perfect here because a chimney pot in the sun exists in many windows and angles. I see you have clustered yours with earthenware pots that spill out their plants. All the questions will walk arm-in-arm and study how the frosty roof glows at each tile. If you are hesitating, perhaps go back and cross out the last half-sentence and see what fresh blood pours from the cut. Then consider the colour of the stone. You can endure for longer in times of extremity before gracefully withdrawing. Have you thought of water? You would do well to think of it. If I am honest I am not sure about squares and have found my soul elongates, rather than swells, if you have one dimension shorter than the other. In my uncertainty I thought of asking my elaborate horse chestnut, but trees have very few opinions about rectangles. But there is much to be said for a circular or elliptical pool surrounded by a low wall. Opportunities for freshness and memory in the afternoons. It is possible to admit desperate unhappiness in a sweep of field looking over towards the dark treeline, then return and sit taking off your boots. There must be corners and the angles must be right. How the courtyard relates to other surfaces and spaces will come in the end to determine certain significant outcomes. The corners have always been the places I forget to look in for my lost things. I look inside the house for them as if they will be sitting on a table wrapped in brown paper. So perhaps some stone steps set tight against the wall will ensure constant mitigation. Will any door give directly onto the world? I believe that to be usual but I also know of quietnesses which may not be attainable that way. Once I was in a courtyard too small and dark for anything other than grimly hurrying across, and that brings me onto size. When the lamps are lit will there be a large patch of darkness in the middle where all anguishes can lounge and stretch themselves until morning. This risks accusations of giving refuge, but at least you will know where they are. Enough of the world comes down into the courtyard, then after a time the light and doubt move on. I have not mentioned archways but with your leave I may return to them later as I would rather not cry just yet. Red bricks, red bricks are especially wholesome. And as I have said, the corners must be closed, you cannot create a true courtyard using separate buildings with spaces between them. A supreme example of this once made me desperate to plunge into the river and escape. I am in fact open to the idea of a river as a fourth side as long as the walls go right to the water. Perhaps my feelings about water require some attention. The one thing about a larger courtyard is that a single tree in the centre, or even better a little off-centre, can bring interest and friendliness. As dawn creeps in a tree is the thing I love to watch the most. I hold a particular archway very close under my ribs. Could you arrange for the lamps to be extinguished at intervals rather than all at once? But you may indeed wish to announce the arrival of the morning. There is also the time spent up in the tower and out in the forest to be taken into account here, and the separate griefs that might be carried between each. Even the type of fastening on the door can make the greatest difference and so I have always preferred latches that need lifting. These are genuine questions to ask yourself. Of course some of this is like discovering your eyes are shut when you thought you had them open reading. The archway, this is all I am able to say, led to a cold chapel where a choir sang from time to time. Leading to places is the reluctant work archways must do. And yes, it is easy sometimes to feel overlooked, by all the windows and the people inside the rooms. If fellowship is important to you I have another version of this ready to hand.