Sign Language

[rowens]

               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?

[dukealien]

               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?

A shivery ride, particularly toward the end.  I tripped slightly on "lay," thinking (pedantically) that it should be "lie" since the rest of the sentence is present tense.  But against that, "lie" would introduce an issue of truthfulness as well as losing the internal rhyme with "pray."  The idea certainly gets across better this way.

Great images - bottles on fingers, wicked crab.

[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.

[busker]

Perhaps the only cliche is “summer has gone”; the rest of the poem is beautiful
S3, ending with “warm and laughing in water”, particularly so.
A nice, enigmatic little poem

[billy]

apart from the so and so's and the only's i thoroughly enjoyed it. i read it almost as a train of thought poem because there seems to be no transition tween 3 and 4. i think you could cut back on a little of the verbiage but its no biggy, just a thought. i love the opening two lines. it's extremely earthy and real. know it's in miscellaneous but i couldn't stop myself from leaving feedback

               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, 4 so in three lines, it's so so and so and so i suppose so. i just keep getting so stuck on them.
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 for me one only too many.
in desire so wicked and strange?

[rowens]

I am the Fox Mulder of poetry. No matter what ShemthePenMan said. Or didn't say. . . . But I am not yet on the James Merrill thing. He

---

The SOs are to me, just stuff. I could say that if I married the girl I'm talking about, her initials would be S. O. So all the sos would mean something. But since that is so very unlikely, All I can say is that I was repeating things.

---

There're playing an allnight X-Files marathon on BBCAmerica. And God if I aint watching it.

[ellajam]

ha, xfiles has been on here too, though not by my choice.

[rowens]

I've said it before, and say it now: The Twilght Zone is my Old Testament and The X-Files is my New Testament. That's true. Late at night, I experience spiritual things that I make sense of out of The X-Files.