7 Must-Read Denise Levertov Poems

Denise Levertov was an English poet who spent most of her life in the United States. She was the winner of the Lannan Literary Award for Poetry. She was influenced by the Black Mountain poets, specifically William Carlos Williams.

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What Were They Like?

‘What Were They Like?’ by Denise Levertov criticizes the Vietnam War, presenting the suffering of Vietnamese people while imagining genocide.

Denise Levertov is known for her anti-war stance, and the Vietnam War heavily influenced her major work. She publicly condemned the War, participating in movements and rallies concerning the War, and felt it was the poet's duty to bring attention to the injustices of the Vietnam War. This poem is part of her protest against the Vietnam War, focusing on the suffering and human cost of the War, imagining a future where the American bombing genocide has wiped out the Vietnamese. The war was still going on when the poem was written.

Did the people of Viet Nam

use lanterns of stone?

Did they hold ceremonies

to reverence the opening of buds?

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Pleasures

Denise Levertov’s ‘Pleasures’ celebrates the beauty hidden within everyday objects, inviting readers to discover the extraordinary in the ordinary.

This poem is a good representation of Denise Levertov's poetry. It encapsulates many elements that are characteristic of her work, such as her keen observation of the natural world, her attention to sensory details, and her ability to find beauty in ordinary moments. The poem showcases Levertov's skill in capturing the essence of a subject and conveying it with precision and depth. 'Pleasures' exemplifies the themes and poetic style that are often associated with Denise Levertov's body of work.

I like to find

what's not found

at once, but lies

within something of another nature,

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Caedmon

Levertov’s ‘Caedmon’ retells the story of that night when an Anglo-Saxon simpleton transformed into the most-famous name of Old English literature.

All others talked as if

talk were a dance.

Clodhopper I, with clumsy feet

would break the gliding ring.

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Swan in Falling Snow

Denise Levertov’s poem ‘Swan in Falling Snow’ is about a speaker’s discovery of a swan’s frozen body. His sad feeling for the creature is portrayed in this poem.

Upon the darkish, thin, half-broken ice

There seemed to lie a barrel-sized, heart-shaped snowball,

Frozen hard, its white

identical with the untrodden white

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For weeks the poem of your body,

of my hands upon your body

stroking, sweeping, in the rite of

worship, going

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