White snow and ice, black tree trunks and open water, gray clouds and branches, brown grass and cattails. Not a dab of primary color brightens the dreary landscape. The just rising sun only subdues the deep gray of the cloud cover in the eastern sky. I am skiing the dike that splits the western marshes of the Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge. It is a cold, crisp morning and pinpoints of snow fall like sparks from tree limbs.
Wildlife contribute no additional hues.
A lone black starling flies off. A brown deer points its black nose at me, flicks its white tail and bounds away into the dark woods. Fox and turkey tracks are gray against the snow. Little white, gray and black chickadees and nuthatches search the tree trunks. A cotillion of arguing black crows passes overhead, their raucous caws cutting into the pleasant silence of the morning.