Sign Language

[ellajam]

               Sign Language
  
I carry empty bottles on my fingers
to the outside trash hearing country music
from my neighbor's truck, in the cool air,
and wonder where summer has gone,
and why aloneness is so sweet yet so hard.

Hearing the hoot of an owl so strange,
and so rare that close to the house,
in my proud superstitions, I pray
for forgiveness for family arguments
as I lay in bed for hours.

Then the warmth in the school library
brings a comfort; riding home past
the warmly lit YMCA at night,
summer is probably there at that moment,
warm and laughing in water.

But I, born under Cancer,
was meant to bear cold things,
only train my pincers and appreciate my shell.
Why do I seek rare feeling only
in desire so wicked and strange?

There's a lot I like here, where summer resides and the owl and crab. I found myself wanting to think about small changes to the opening: the air is cool with a period or semi before it, the sonics of solitude vs aloneness. But the more I read the muddier it became and I remembered that you've probably made these choices intentionally, I need more time to get why. Thanks for the read.