Marginalia
I am always trying to die
not big deaths, but small
deaths with paper and hard-cover books
deaths with envelopes and swirly-que doodles
deaths with text and the margins of thought
that can never hang from my head and never be wrought
I am always withering at one branch
like a sick gull’s wing
I am always tying one foot to the long rope
that drags from the ferryman’s boat
I ask for forgiveness, but I only want the broken glass
I’ve only ever wanted to take what was inside
and throw it in your face
to ask you to tell me you see it too,
and then to be done with the things that almost speak
and be done with wondering when the curtain will drop
just repairing to the afterlife with this stick
and some sand to scratch no symbols in.
-Nina Alvarez
Poem of the Month 
Short Sweet Dream
Kept me in afine frame of mind,
A sensation of some kind.
I admire you and I’m happy as kings,
Sure, I’ll fly if I had wings.
I compare you to a rainbow,
Decorated in colours ‘Magnificant Seven’ VIBGYOR.
You ‘re like a vanishing dew-drop on a leaf,
Sparkling elegance, far beyond a man’s belief.
‘Tis similar to a bubble in the air,
Which bursts before you say, ‘Hey! look there.
It won’t be in vain,
If I tell you, I lov’ to see you agian.
I hope and pray,
That you may come true one fine day.
I was disturbed by the morning sunbeam,
But, hat’s off to you my worthy dream.
Though you stayed with only for a while.
A BIG TANK Q in a real Yankee style.
M. Rezvie Omerdeen.
36/19, Harrison Jones’ Road,
Matale.
Sri Lanka
27th September 1994