We have come far south.
Beyond here, the oldest women
shelling limas into black shawls.
Portillo scratching his name
on the walls, the slender ribbons
of piss, children patting the mud.
If we go on, we might stop
in the street in the very place
where someone disappeared
and the words Come with us! we might
hear them. If that happened, we would
lead our lives with our hands
tied together. That is why we feel
it is enough to listen
to the wind jostling lemons,
to dogs ticking across the terraces,
knowing that while birds and warmer weather
are forever moving north,
the cries of those who vanish
might take years to get here.
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Leonard Durso 
She’s a favorite of mine. Did a workshop with her back in the early 90s. Great fun. How nice to see her work again.
We were at Bowling Green Univ at the same time in the MFA program but she was in poetry and I was in fiction so our paths didn’t cross much. I have always, though, admired he r work and have a few books of hers in storage with so many others back in NY.
I know San Onofre well. Surf culture owes much to the place. I also like Forche’s work, almost as much as I like Sharon Olds’.
Another poet to admire.
Just read this poem to my poetry circle (June 7, 2020). They were baffled by it. To me the poem recognizes the limitation of witness. “We have come far south,” but we will not go further; we will not live our lives, “with our hands tied together.” And, “the cries of those who vanish
might take years to get here.”
you seem to understand it.