Marcelo Hernandez - One Poem

On a Sunday Afternoon

I.C.E. bled though our door packing heat.
We took the lead,

marched in front
of a jittery virgin

trigger-finger ready
to earn his gold-stitched vest.

We fetched stained papers
masked in plastic

& jolted from the blast
of a tailpipe backfiring,

calling like winter
from a shallow puddle.

They checked us & slid out.
Their van melted into

every tinted van,
so we babbled like Patriots.

When no one was looking,
the floor rotted in stagnant water.



Marcelo Hernandez is an avid dancer, carpenter, and handy man. He is an undergraduate student at Cal State Sacramento and the new 2010/11 poetry section editor for Calaveras Station. He won first place in the undergraduate poetry section of the Bazzannela literary award and is recipient of the Warmdal and Willhelm Memorial Scholarships. He lives in Yuba City, California.