MARGINS

Margins, intended to force order,

Succeed only if we accept them.

They are not natural.

The richness of life

Overflows imposed margins

Like people spill unstopped

Across unseen political borders.

Even in the wild

Where a first look sees a line

Marking the edge of life—

Beyond which nothing seems to grow—

Yet, should we look more closely

With a trained eye,

There we will find life

Dormant waiting for change,

Or actively thriving in adversity.

Spilling into paper margins

Are the fantasies

Escaped from boredom.

In the margins

Are the afterthoughts,

The reconsidered,

The questions to pursue.

Margins have the climaxes

Of thoughts left unexpressed.

What are margins

But arbitrary boundaries?

They are as much imagination

As the insubordination

Bursting into their cordoned off space.