The February Featured Poet is Juan Perez
Please feel free to email Juan at: gotobulldog87@yahoo.com
A NOISY GOODBYE
Raises revolver to push up his hat
Revealing empty sockets for eyes
Wicked smile shining away
The white of his teeth bursting with pride
This county mounty was surely infected
Nothing human left under that skin
A good guy for sure when he was alive
Now there’s only one thing left to do
I shot the sheriff
He wasn’t human after all
RED IS THE BARN
Red is the barn
Like heavy stains upon the floor
Near heaps of lifeless bodies
Of the old farmer and his kin
Red is the barn
That had seen without eyes
The full fury of deep evil
That took life without remorse
Red is the barn
Like the pupils of the aggressor
That lurks amongst the heavy hay
Like the animals that live within
Red is the barn
That does not favor peace
Nor houses such tranquility
But the silence of final death
Red is the barn
Where the truth is hard to swallow
Like a hatchet to the throat
Like red forever to a barn
ODE TO DR. RICHARD J. GATLING
Each loveless, round kissed the divine body
Goodbye forever riddles with meaningless holes
Needles to say, a gift from the most merciful
Death blissfully quick unlike before when
Man dwindled on within his death bed
From the imperfect infection rather than destructive force
She is truly beautiful, lady harbinger of hell
Fury fantastic of the marvelous, new machine
Things will never ever be the same
No they just never will again
MONKEY SEE, MONKEY DO
thou shall speak no evil
for it is the beginning
the end is now the present
thou shall see no evil
for they are before you
blindness matters not
thou shall hear no evil
for they have now spoken
although you don’t understand why
it begins with simple phrases
where they see therefore they do
they thus acted and copied man
hence believe that they are now you
what else is there to be human
you did your work well
teaching to think and do
their genesis, for humans hell
let it be repeated what can easily be sung
that kind of sums up what all went wrong
where monkey see, monkey will do
guess who made a fool out of you
The above photograph shows Juan Perez with fellow author and poet Joe R. Lansdale, and was taken in Austin, Texas for The Armadillo Con 32 on August 27-29, 2010. The book Joe is holding is the first Horror Zine anthology book titled And Now the Nightmare Begins: THE HORROR ZINE Volume 1, which features both Juan and Joe.
After a decade of military service, including the First Gulf War (1991), Juan Manuel Pérez is now a public school history teacher and author of six poetry chapbooks which includes Dial H For Horror (2006), plus two full contemporary multi-culture poetry collections, Another Menudo Sunday (2007) and the e-book, O Dark Heaven (2009). He has completed three other poetry manuscripts: W.U.I.: Written Under The Influence of Trinidad Sanchez, Jr., Comic Book Love Affair and Make Tortillas Not War.
Juan is a member of the San Antonio Poets Association, the Poetry Society of Texas, and the Science Fiction Poetry Association, as well as, student of the great Chicano poet Trinidad Sánchez, Jr. He has also been a featured reader at many poetry venues in Southwest Texas. His work has recently appeared in Jazma Online, The People's Comic Book Newsletter, Boundless, Voices De La Luna, International Poetry Review, Illumen, Star*Line: the Journal of the Science Fiction Poetry Association, The Poet Magazine, di-verse-city, Voices Along The River, The Dreamcatcher, Inkwell Echoes, The Palm¹s Leaf, and Message of the Muse. He was recently named the 2nd Runner Up in the 2009 San Antonio Poet's Association's Poet Laureate Competition.
Please visit Juan at: http://www.juanmperez.com/
You can also visit Juan at Poets and Writers HERE.
