Sunset, Monday, 20 July 2009

William Theodore Van Doren. Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on paper, 16 x 20.

Gray as the moon’s surface on a black-and-white TV.

Gray as silver reflections from a spacesuit.

Gray as a monumental statement missing just one little one-letter word.

Gray as the dark shadow of the white or golden or orange beam of a waxing or waning moon on any night of any year of any era.

Gray made of blues, violets, ochres, reds, yellows, browns, like the secretive and powerful gray government of a great democracy.

Gray as green trees shrouded in rain.

Gray as the black body of a camera.

Gray as the gray plastic or shiny aluminum computer casing.

Gray as letters on the screen.

Gray and bright and white as light.