The soft remnants of summer

Cattails on Coon Lake, Anoka County, MN.  On a sunny afternoon the winter here is so beautiful, but for the last several days it's been mostly dreary, cloudy, foggy, melty. Our January thaw is coming to an end, however, as temperatures may drop into the minus teens Fahrenheit in a week or so.  But these cattails will still be there, on Coon Lake, frozen until spring, when they melt with the snow into the marsh and feed the new green growth of midsummer.