but when my hand lies cupped within your own
and softly pressed against your nearly sleeping
throat, your breath exhilarates my hastening
heart, the words invisible in dark,

the melodies all guessed as when we play
that game and thrum each other's lips to old familiar
rhythms--"Jingle Bells" in astonished June,
"Row Your Boat" in bedraggled November--and right

before I give up on "Under the Boardwalk,"
one of us thumps out "Frosty the Snowman"
like a bad pun we uncued quote in unison
as when we watch and bear the night inside our lids.

I feel sweet glisten, hairline sweat on finger-backs
to light the caverns of the world
like fireflies' green musk, to comfort like the pillowed
jaws of two large dogs, who black and brown soften

with the cure of our voices, who sing, each one,
when the other is just away but know we will not part,
our hearts in all our throats, you sleeping, whispering,
white-feather chorus to my life, you singer, you song yourself.

--by Robert W. Hill
January 7, 1996