Ricardo Sánchez-Minotaur

Ricardo Sánchez, the minotaur poet. The bull in his stance, the throaty bellow of his voice as he reads, his unbridled energy, the looming threat of aggression, the violence of his past, and yes, the beauty and passivism of his thought today . . . all translate directly into poems of power and sensitivity, protest and love, impatience with the present, but confidence in the future.

No Chicano poet has been more productive nor has seen his works published by the full gamut of the literary establishment: from Madison Avenue commercial houses to university presses and the smallest of the small presses. The astonishing number of poems that Sánchez has produced, not to mention the lengthy published volumes, is overwhelming. The thousands of pages of verse articulated in English, Spanish and often a mixture of both, is exhaustive. The thousands of lines of running autobiography document the agony of this minotaur possessed by the need to express himself in poetry. Poetry was the release and salvation from Sánchez' real-life labyrinth, the caves of his imprisonment, the vicious cycle of crime and punishment. Poetry is his path to another more eternalizing cycle, that of creative expression and response, the posing of the eternal questions of life, love, and social justice through humanizing dialog with his readers.

Selected Poems is Arte Público Press' endeavor to introduce new readers to Ricardo Sánchez' English-language poetry. The reader will soon discover that Sánchez is a genius whose real existence and poetic creations merge, leaving only a very fine line between life and lyric poetry. One of the great achievements of Sánchez poetry is, in fact, the power of his autobiography to convince us that his poetry is life, that the protagonist of his verse is the real-life, flesh-and-blood Ricardo Sánchez. Sánchez' poetry and the poetry in his life have given us the structure for this book. We have followed the minotaur into the nether world of his incarcerations, through the labyrinths of his thoughts and feelings, up to the world of freedom, light and promise, only to see the poet-minotaur discover another level of labyrinthian confinement: this cavernous world of injustice and oppression, where the only possible guiding light is love, sexual love and love of friends and family, enough love to empower the struggle for the creation of a better world in the future.

The poems are presented-with two exceptions-in the chronological order of their composition, in the precise order of Sánchez' real-life experiences and perceptions. As such, they are an autobiography, as well as a case study in the esthetic development of one of the most complex of writers.

After the brief introduction, "Ricardo Sánchez (Sometimes)," the section entitled "La Pinta/The Joint" brings together some of the poems that first introduced Ricardo Sánchez to a national audience. They are the seething, writhing, wailing poems of a confined mythological beast. They were composed while the author was removed from society and forced to come to terms with prison bars, and the billy clubs and rifles of his guardians; and he was forced to come to terms with himself, with solitude. It is ironic that the gestation of these early poems took place in Soledad Prison, a name evoking so many psychic and emotional responses for this writer whose first, most intimate language is Spanish.

The second and final section of Selected Poems follows the minotaur on the loose in the brightness of day, but certainly disillusioned by not being able to find his personal freedom mirrored in the "Barrios of the World." From city to town in the mainland United States, to sojourns in Europe and Alaska, this restless, impatient force which is Ricardo Sánchez, explores, at times with Swiftian eyes, at times with the eyes of Candide, the social organization fettered by corruption and bestiality. Sánchez, the previously confined beast, finds more inhumanity and crime in the outside world and its movers than among the former denizens of his cellblocks. Lost in the daily maze of conflicting cultures and classes, the only positive values for Sánchez are continuous struggle, honesty (a shedding of social masks) and love of family, friends, art.

Nicolás Kanellos, Publisher
Arte Público Press