“I sip the Dom P, watchin Gandhi til I’m charged
Then writin in my book of rhymes, all the words past the margin
To hold the mic I’m throbbin, mechanical movement
Understandable smooth shit that murderers move wit”
-Nas
Simply put, Across the Margin is an online Arts & Culture magazine / publishing company / media group. Within these “pages” can be found an eclectic mix of fiction, criticism, essays, satire, poetry, podcasts, and more that explore the current state of the world around us, and the depths of our human nature.
While this explanation may suffice to most, we applaud the fact that our readers desire more. So, let’s dig deeper…
I have heard in passing that if you want to actualize your dreams, if you truly want to make them real and drag them from the depths of thought, and conceptualize those suckers, that you should take the time to write them down. That makes sense to me, I suppose. To achieve your goals you must define them, and to realize them you should know what they are so that the proper steps can be taken to make it happen. That sounds well enough and all, but a little too cut and dry. A little too self-help book, too motivational speaker for my likes.
So when I sit down and try to explain the goal of this website, or even what Across the Margin actually is, it is easier for me to share what we hope it becomes. We hope for a place where writing is king, but a devout one and one who serves his minions in good faith. We hope it is a place where thoughts are shared, scrutinized, and eventually beaten and broken down to the most basic of elements, and then reassembled and reborn as a new idea all together. We hope that it is entertaining, oft witty, and full of new and peculiar ideas. We hope that you may laugh, or even cry on our best of days. We hope that insight is gained, thought provoked, and beliefs challenged. And we hope that the site at some point in the near future could possibly be recognized as precocious, or even…good.
But the truth is we don’t know. And therein lies some of the fun. All I can promise, without a shadow of any doubt, is that Across the Margin is a place where boundaries do not exist. It’s a safe house for topics of all kinds. Ideas can expose themselves in the light of the brightest day at Across the Margin with no fear of scrutiny or judgement.
It’s the Island of Misfit Toys speaking their mind. It’s the inmates running the asylum with pride and with the efficiency that eluded the previous government. The benchwarmers getting their run and making damn good use of the time. A pirate ship set sail after the captain has been cast overboard. Land motherf*ckin ho….you get the idea.
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” – Maya Angelou
Across the Margin is inspired by the lyrics of one of the finest MC’s to ever hold a mic right, Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones. He spoke of “writing in his book of rhymes, all the way past the margin.” He couldn’t stop writing, spitting rhymes. Synapses firing, thoughts developing at such a frantic pace, that he had to get it down, even if it meant breaking one of the simplest rules of writing and breaking into the unknown inhabit-less space that lies past the forever closed and heavily guarded walls of the margin. It is that space where we will dwell. It is there where our voice will echo off the walls and possibly even be heard. Our thoughts, our ideas, our rants, and who knows what else at this point, will be there….just Across the Margin.
– Michael Shields
Editor, Across the Margin