With this poem, Carlo won the Border Voices Poetry Contest over a decade ago within the San Diego County high school division. The Iraq War dominated headlines at that time.

Somewhere men sleep on coarse beds of fiery coals
Lying with warm tears streaming from open eyes
They wake with a pervading air of hopelessness
Rising, like volcanic steam from a bathtub.

And we will factor polynomials.

Somewhere grenades are A6 next to pretzels in vending machines
And ignorant men covered with gasoline are smoking cigarettes
Igniting themselves like makeshift torches with lighter fluid
As their innocent children play tag in minefields.

And we must solve linear inequalities.

Now the world slides like ice on a hot iron
When our tables are soaked with gasoline
Only God can save us from lighting them
And burning with our rational expressions and linear interpolations.

Math test after lunch.