Cabin Nights

Drawn to the silk of your skin
my body follows your hollows and hills
warm in the early chill

All the night creatures
bound in the breathing air
end their song in country silence

Through the lingering stillness
I catch the rush of the swollen stream
water smoothing stones

Snowbound

Inside the storm
inside the warm room
deep inside the heart’s dream
we are finger spelling
in each other’s hands.

For a timeless space
there is no pushing away
as we draw close.
In other rooms the ordinary
porcelain, garlic, linens.

Outside the air
is starched white lace
binding us inside the warm
room inside the song
our fingers play

Patti Tana is Professor Emerita of English at Nassau Community College and the 2009 Walt Whitman Birthplace Long Island Poet of the Year. Any Given Day (Whittier Publications, Inc., 2011) is her eighth collection of poems. Visit pattitana.com.