A few days before his death in 1996, Larry Levis mentioned to his
friend and former instructor Philip Levine that he had "an
all-but-completed manuscript" of poems. Levine had years earlier
recognized Levis as "the most gifted and determined young poet I
have ever had the good fortune to have in one of my classes"; after
Levis's death, Levine edited the poems Levis had left behind. What
emerged is this haunting collection, Elegy. The poems were written
in the six years following publication of his previous book, The
Widening Spell of the Leaves, and continue and extend the jazz
improvisations on themes that gave those poems their resonance.
There are poems of sudden stops and threats from the wild: an
opossum halts traffic and snaps at pedestrians in posh west Los
Angeles; a migrant worker falls victim to the bites of two
beautiful black widow spiders; horses starve during a Russian
famine; a thief, sitting in the rigging of Columbus’s ship,
contemplates his work in the New World. The collection culminates
in the elegies written to a world in which culture fragments; in
which the beasts of burden—the horses, the migrant workers—are
worked toward death; a world in which "Love's an immigrant, it
shows itself in its work. / It works for almost nothing"; a world
in which "you were no longer permitted to know, / Or to decide for
yourself, / Whether there was an angel inside you, or whether there
wasn't." Elegy, as Levine says, was "written by one of our
essential poets at the very height of his powers. His early death
is a staggering loss for our poetry, but what he left is a major
achievement that will enrich our lives."
General
Imprint: |
University of Pittsburgh Press
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
Pitt Poetry Series |
Release date: |
October 1997 |
First published: |
October 1997 |
Authors: |
Larry Levis
|
Dimensions: |
235 x 145 x 3mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Paperback
|
Pages: |
96 |
Edition: |
New |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-8229-5648-8 |
Categories: |
Books
|
LSN: |
0-8229-5648-9 |
Barcode: |
9780822956488 |
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