The Poetry of David Hernandez

David Hernandez

As I was reading through David Hernandez’s poems in The Wind Shifts anthology of recent Latino/a poetry, one of the first things that struck me was that many of the elements that I have come to think of as typical in Southwest Latino/a literature were not present very often. Sure, there were mentions of California, a poem about the speaker’s inability to speak Spanish, and an allusion to a coyote (specifically Wile E.), but most of his poems seemed to focus on events that are, well, normal. Menial labor, sex, mourning, hospitals, and even traffic are all valid topics in Hernandez’s poems. There are poems that present more unusual circumstances (finding a dead possum underneath a porch, a fight between old men in at nursing home buffet, musings on the butterfly effect, what it’s like to be the wife of a taxidermist), but even these circumstances seems strangely relatable.

While Hernandez does not explicitly write about political and social matters, this does not mean that he is unaware of them, only that he wishes to talk about a wide variety of topics that aren’t always specific to the Latino/a community. As Francisco Aragon notes in the introduction to the anthology, Latino/a poets are not limited to being overtly political, but are free to explore “language and aesthetics”  and any topic they desire (1). Hernandez’s poems are a good instance of this: he uses simple, elegant language to mimic the speech patterns of English in order to describe moments in the daily life of people within and without the Latino/a community, effectively giving him a wide audience.

Perhaps it is the way that Hernandez is able to use such simple language so powerfully that makes me like his poems so much - many of my other favorite poets take similar approaches to demonstrating that just because language is simple doesn’t mean it is ineffective. Take the beginning of the poem below:

Man on an Island

By island I mean this narrow stretch of lawn

dividing the road, a boulder here and here,

little trees with trunks as thick as broom handles.

By man I mean the one pushing the mower

with a red bandana wound around his head,

his face enameled in sweat.   

"ThreeThink" by David Hernandez

Hernandez’s presents a metaphor and then immediately proceeds to break it down piece by piece, painting an image of a man “surrounded / not by water but by tar” with cars driving by like sharks. By the end of the poem the speaker’s suggestion that the man could send off a message in a bottle (the quintessential man-stranded-on-an-island approach to rescue) seems like a logical move for someone who is so isolated in the plain sight of a bustling city. (149)

            Another poem in which Hernandez takes something easily recognizable and makes it wholly new is “Wile E. Coyote Achieves Nirvana,” in which the oft-foiled cartoon predator realizes that his attachment to earthly desires is causing him to suffer. In the cartoons it’s hard not to have at least some sympathy for the Coyote despite his ineptitude and fanaticism, and it is this sympathy that is expounded upon it the poem. Hernandez takes us into the mind of the Coyote, imagining what it must be like to be reborn after another each ridiculous death. It wasn’t long before I was envisioning myself and the rest of humanity running around as hapless cartoon creatures, each unable to stop chasing the impossible. When “the bulb of enlightenment / blazes over [the Coyote’s] head,” and he realizes that “craving equals suffering,” I was relieved and saddened (144). One of the hazards of identifying with a cartoon scavenger is that when said cartoon scavenger gives up his life’s goal you start imagining what it would be like to lose your desires and motivations. And all this from a poem about a Loony Toons character who happens to be a creature that is now associated not only with the mangy animal, but human traffickers!

"Flower" by David Hernandez

            Hernandez’s ability to imbue seemingly whimsical events with thought-provoking ideas does not mean that he is incapable of writing poems that are more overtly emotional. Take “Dear Spanish,” for instance. The speaker of this poem is quite literally addressing the Spanish language, expressing remorse for “kicking [it] in the shin in kindergarten” and asking to be blessed with the ability to speak it so that he can say goodbye to his grandfather who is leaving to retire in Chile (150). Ultimately, the speaker is unable to make that last connection to his family and is forced to reflect on how he is blocked from communicating in either English or Spanish, instead turning to “a language built on silence / where every word is swallowed instead of said” (150). The poem isn’t so much tragic as it is sad, but it is certainly heart-wrenching.

Naturally, the wealth of poems that David Hernandez has published means that trying to find common elements in all of them is somewhat futile. However, in what I have read of his work I find that he doesn’t bash you over the head with the messages he is getting across, nor does he aim to get a reaction by shocking you with overly dramatic images. Rather, Hernandez takes an approach that allows him to gradually reveal new and intriguing ways of thinking about life in general. The aspects of life in question may be grounded in a Latino/a framework (as evidenced in his poems that mention language, South American countries, Southwestern imagery, or class status), but they may also be much broader in scope. In my mind, Hernandez is acknowledging the unique aspects of a variety of cultures while seeking to remind his readers that there are a great many aspects of life that merit a closer look, regardless of their origin.

Other Poems I Liked

American Water 

Museum Guard

Lisa

Beginning at the End

Remember It Wrong 

The Taxicab Incident, Driving Towards the Sun, The Goldfish 

Additional Information

David Hernandez is currently a professor at University of California, Irvine. In addition to this he has also worked as a web designer and artist, and has published three volumes of poetry (Hoodwinked, Always Danger, and A House Waiting for Music) and two young adult novels (Suckerpunch, and No More Us for You) which have been well received. In 2011 he received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Poetry. More of his biography, poems, publications,and art can be found at his website here. 

Bibliography 

Hernandez, David. The Wind Shifts: New Latino Poetry. Ed. Francisco Aragón. Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 2007. 142-150. Print.

“Poetry.” David Hernandez, n.d. Web. 22 Feb. 2012. <http://www.davidahernandez.com/poetry.html>

Images Bibliography

“The Official David Hernandez Website.” David Hernandez, n.d. Web. 22 Feb. 2012. <http://www.davidahernandez.com>

Why Creative Nonfiction is Awesome

In my post from last week, I mentioned Luis Alberto Urrea’s 2004 book The Devil’s Highway. The book is a work of creative nonfiction, a genre that takes the results of journalistic research and presents them in a literary way. As this was my first encounter with the genre, I spent the first chapter or so of the book rather confused, despite my love of both history and literature. My historical sensibilities reacted to the stories as too dramatic or untrustworthy while at the same time as my literary sensibilities were annoyed by the streams of information that did not yet connect to the stories. Ultimately, however, I found myself appreciating the style and content of the book. I’d even say that I liked and enjoyed it – inasmuch as anyone can like or enjoy hearing about poverty, organized crime, exploitation, warped systems of justice, ignorant bureaucracies, misinformed people, and slow, torturous death by heat and thirst.

            There’s a saying that “fiction is a lie that tells the truth.”  Being that The Devil’s Highway tells the story the death of 14 men attempting to cross the Sonoran Desert, it is easy to see the unworldly setting and horrifying events can come off as over dramatized or overemotional. Not because horrible things don’t happen, but because gruesome deaths are so frequent a subject in many forms of fiction - crime shows, thriller novels, horror movies, violent video games, and so on. While the events described in The Devil’s Highway do seem as if they were they could only exist in a fictional realm, Urrea manages to balance out the seemingly over-dramatic with harsh but effective reminders that the events are indeed real.  

            At first I felt like it was too factual, but soon enough characters came along to illustrate the situation and give faces to concepts – no longer just “the illegal immigrant” or “the coyote” or “the Border Guard,” but very human people. Stories developed and Urrea’s poet-nature displayed itself and I got drawn in. As the stories developed, however, I was always prevented from viewing it as fiction. Any time something seemed outlandish or overly sentimental, Urrea would pull back and describe the broader context in all its researched glory to remind the reader that what he is describing is real, and that it goes beyond the crossing attempt of 26 and the death of 14 or them to a much larger picture. But after descriptions of the broader systems that influence migration, Urrea returns to the characters lest his readers forget that these policies do affect lives, and that those lives matter. Urrea’s way of dealing with creative nonfiction ensures that the history does not forget its purpose and relevance, while the story is shown to go beyond the imagined into the real and something we can do something about. It’s an admirable blend of nonfiction and literary techniques that I think brings two very needed elements together for a much better overall understanding of the situation. 

Little Picture/Big Picture

     I’m not sure that I can talk about Ana Castillo’s recent novel The Guardians without discussing The Devil’s Highway, another recent book on a similar topic by Luis Alberto Urrea. Both books – Castillo’s novel and Urrea’s nonfiction – directly discuss the perils of immigrating to the United States via the Southwest border. Castillo sets her work in New Mexico, and tells the story of a family torn apart by the economic, social, and political boundaries that make immigration so difficult for Latino/as. Urrea, however, recounts the story of the death of 14 men who died in their attempt to cross through the Arizonian desert known as the Devil’s Highway. Urrea creates a work of creative nonfiction whereby he presents the results of his investigative research while illustrating what he knows with short vignettes about the lives of everyone involved in the incident (the immigrants, coyotes, Border Patrol officers, consuls, and so on).

     Given that The Guardians has distinct and developed characters (four of whom are the book’s narrators), I expected to feel more attached to it than to The Devil’s Highway, but I discovered the opposite was true. The determined and strong Tía Regina is an intriguing figure, yes, and her nephew Gabriel (Gabo) is a tragic one, but I can’t say I formed a strong attachment to either of them or to the other two main characters Miguel and Milton. The disappearance of Regina’s brother and Gabo’s father Rafael during his attempt to cross into the US illegally is tragic, but despite the searching and shock they go through I had difficulty relating to their struggle. It was not until I began reading The Devil’s Highway that I realized that what was missing from the story was knowledge of the broader picture.

     This is understandable because Guardians is narrated by characters with a limited viewpoints and knowledge. Castillo does try to inform her readers through the character of Miguel, a high school history teacher, but this and the brief flashbacks into the characters’ personal histories did not illuminate much. For instance, the reason why Regina’s family migrated to the US is implied (poverty), but it is never described. The knowledge of Rafa’s disappearance trying to cross the border makes Regina cry and Gabo turn all the more to his devout Catholic faith, but their inner emotion are not expressed, and their ties to Rafael are never accompanied by any real description of a relationship.

     Luckily, The Devil’s Highway put some of this in perspective by giving the bigger picture of systematic poverty, skewed immigration policies, and bureaucratic inanity. The book has a huge cast of immigrants, citizens, smugglers, politicians, and officers, and there isn't room to describe everyone's background – but when Urrea describes something, he does so so poetically that even the smallest bit of information draws you in emotionally. Although Urrea manages to give a broader, more factual, and more emotional "big picture" account of border crossing, but when paired with Castillo’s "little picture" account of the daily life of those left behind, as uncompelling as it might be at times, makes both works better. 

A Bit of a Rant on Ignorance and Fear

The documentary 9500 Liberty records the events surrounding the passing of an immigration law in Virginia’s Prince William County that required police to check the immigration status of anyone they had “probable cause” to suspect had entered the country illegally (which could be determined by skin color and language, leading to unavoidable racial profiling of non-whites). The supposed rationale for passing the bill was outlined by blogger Greg Letiecq and was advocated primarily by people who had vaguely-formed beliefs that the influx of Hispanic immigrants meant that their communities were threatened by increases in crime, drunk driving, a bad job market, and – worst of all – the Spanish language.

            I must admit that I spent a lot of my time watching this film feeling my blood boil for so many reasons I can’t list them all here. Bigotry, racism, intolerance, ulterior motives (like getting reelected), and anger all played into the introduction and passing of the law. In my mind these components can be reduced to two things: ignorance and fear. Although the two work independently, the combination of the two is powerful and cyclical: the more you are unaware of the complexities of a situation, the more likely you are to make generalizations and stereotypes, which in turn makes it much easier to take a concern or worry and apply it to a broader context that leads into full-blown fear.

            My perspective as an outsider (and also as a white, higher-educated, liberal, young person) means that I saw much of the arguments for the immigration law in a more critical context. Much of the testimonies struck me as not just uninformed or ruled by emotion, but completely ludicrous - case in point, the woman who claimed that “illegals” were responsible for 9/11, or Letiecq’s comments on how the law was the will of God, or insistence that slavery was a needed aspect of US society because it needed something to overcome. Not all arguments were so clearly twisted, though: assertions that immigrants take jobs, drain money, commit crimes, and so on all seem as if they could be proved. That they aren’t proved but that people continue to believe these assertions speaks to the way fear operates.

            What perhaps boggles me the most (besides the fact that such a law was passed at all) is that things are so vague for so many people involved. The “Help Save Manassas” group isn’t particularly clear on what they are saving Manassas from – they seem to think that immigrants who entered the US illegally are the greatest cause of decay in… what, exactly? Protecting the community from crime is one thing, but protecting it from Spanish is strange. What exactly is it that people fear about Spanish? That they won’t be able to communicate? That they are forced to admit that the world does not operate exclusively in English and that they might need to learn to speak another language themselves? That because their notion of American identity is tied up with language, that this identity is being undermined? There are so many questions I have about how fear operates on such comparatively less important questions such as these. I hope that the (eventual) removal of “probable cause” from the law has begun to force people to realize that there are larger and far more relevant issues surrounding immigration. I hope, too, that it won’t take the division of a community and ostracization of a people to realize this in the future.