Corinne Diana, the Provincetown poet and public defender who wrote the poetry collection Lesbian in Hiding, died on February 1, 2026.

Born in Boston on May 29, 1943, and orphaned soon afterward, she was adopted by Ray and Norma Buttaro and raised in East Cambridge and then Woburn, Massachusetts. After graduating from Woburn Memorial High School in 1960, she attended Boston University, spent a semester at New York University, and earned a B.A. in 1964. She later completed a master’s degree in English literature at Northeastern University and studied for a Ph.D. in English literature at Brandeis University with the goal of becoming a poet. She was elected to the Woburn School Committee in 1976, chaired the Woburn Democratic City Committee, ran unsuccessfully for state representative in 1978, and served in the administration of Governor Edward J. King as assistant secretary for education.

She earned a J.D. from Suffolk Law School in 1981. That same year she came out as a lesbian and divorced. She worked first in private practice and then as a public defender, and she was still defending clients at Orleans District Court in the week before her death, with much of her work in juvenile advocacy. After Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage she married Heather Baker, becoming stepmother to Baker’s two young sons; the marriage ended in divorce.

A regular visitor to Provincetown for years, she bought a house there in 1986 and later made it her home. She served on the town licensing board, took part in the Provincetown Theater’s Act Three program for performers over 60, where she wrote and performed a personal monologue, and read at the Friday feminist readings at Womencrafts. Her poems drew on her first lesbian feelings, motherhood, trauma, and recovery, according to Womencrafts owner Michelle Axelson. She sold her collections at East End Books.

White Organdy Curtains (2013) is a short, 22-page verse collection published through Blurb that reflects on life, identity, and personal history.

Lesbian in Hiding (2025) is an independently published poetry collection, illustrated by her daughter K.D. Mernin, that follows a girl growing into womanhood and the complicated experience of coming out in a world that may or may not welcome her.

She also wrote Hot Butch & Cold Bitch, another self-published collection of poetry.

Corinne Diana died of pneumonia and sepsis on February 1, 2026, at Cape Cod Hospital. She was 82. She is survived by her daughters K.D. Mernin of Provincetown and Tracy Grenier-Mernin of Somerville, her son Brendan Mernin of New Jersey, her stepsons Philip Dumont and James Dumont, and three grandchildren. Her former partners Tracy J. Rollins and Janet Murphy predeceased her.