Margins Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

why am I always writing in the margins of my dreams
in a language I myself can never quite understand,
but almost recognize

from clues scattered to the mythical winds
on maps that lead to a treasure, or to nothing at all;
and shakily sketched, as though the pirates

were out of time and rubies,
and in a foreign hand.
someday I will understand

when the skies are a parakeet blue

the way the kaleidoscope fractures
and the endlessness of its variations:
small rose windows of Chartres fading into

the view master slides of Disneyland,
the old school photos and the apocalypse,
near at hand, comprising a triptych design-

or the gold mines- or sudden wonder flaring up, again
when a voice you thought you knew
murmurs like a steely angel

at no crossroads you had even seen before-
and with an annointing finger at an open door:
Now- Choose!

mary angela douglas 12 june 2016