The August-September Special Guest Poet is

Joe R. Lansdale

Please feel free to visit Joe at: http://www.joerlansdale.com/

WHEN YOU’RE MAD

Don’t try to run over anyone,
even if you really want to kill them,
because if you miss,
you might hit an armadillo,
or a sign,
or a big tree,
and you might kill yourself,
and the one you meant to hit,
will think you swerved to miss.

I SAW DEATH IN TOWN THE OTHER DAY

I saw death in town the other day,
dressed up just like me.
I studied him real close.
A shadow of my former self
looked right back at me.

I do not think he’s come just yet,
but he wanted me to know,
there will come a time,
not so far away,
when I will have to go.

He fretted over my thinning hair,
and ran my fingers through its strands
dragging them along,
like metal tines
through slender strips of sand.

When I walked away,
so did he,
leaving the store glass dark,
without image of either him,
or me
to look each other back
and see
the dead man that was to be.

I HATE IT

I hate it,
the way you won’t talk.
sitting there
in your chair,
for so long now,
with my axe in your head.

STUDENTS SHOULD HAVE GUNS

Students should have guns,
to protect themselves,
from killers with guns,
who wouldn’t have guns
if it weren’t so easy to have them,
so why not make it easy
and have it so everyone has guns,
plenty of ammunition,
and target practice.
Then everyone can shoot,
and boy will that show them,
and then they’ll need more guns,
and teachers will have guns,
and they’ll have police dogs next,
and man-eating pigs
with bad attitudes and brass knuckles,
and a big mean clown with a red nose
and floppy shoes,
and muscled arms
to throw chocolate pies.
No.
Change that.
Cream pies.
Chocolate pies, unlike bullets,
are too good to waste.
There are always new kids,
and ammunition,
and more money to be made from gun sales,
but a good home made chocolate pie,
thrown by a clown,
that’s a horrible loss,
and less appetizing to think about,
mixed and splashed
down there in the blood,
wasted,
among the less important dead.

Joe talks about his new book HERE

Joe R. Lansdale is the multi-award winning author of thirty novels and over two hundred short stories, articles and essays. He has written screenplays, teleplays, comic book scripts, and occasionally teaches creative writing and screenplay writing at Stephen F. Austin State University. He has received The Edgar Award, The Grinzani Prize for Literature, seven Bram Stoker Awards, and many others.

His stories Bubba Ho-Tep and Incident On and Off a Mountain Road were both filmed. He is the founder of the martial arts system Shen Chuan, and has been in the International Martial Arts Hall of Fame four times. He lives in East Texas with his wife, Karen.

Visit Joe R. Lansdale HERE

See all of Joe R. Lansdale's books HERE

Introducing the father-son collaboration

THE CRAWLING SKY

Graphic novel with the script adapted by Keith Lansdale

Coming in November 2012 through Antarctic Press

Keith Lansdale: