Quote

our nerve filaments twitch with its presence day and night, nothing we say has not the husky phlegm of it in the saying, nothing we do has the quickness, the sureness, the deep intelligence living at peace would have.

Denise Levertov

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Denise Levertov
Age: 74 †
Born: 1923
Born: October 24
Died: 1997
Died: December 20
Poet
Translator
Writer
Ilford
London
Priscilla D Levertoff
Priscilla Denise Levertoff
Priscilla Denise Levertov
Peace
Quickness
Living
Nerve
War
Nerves
Night
Presence
Phlegm
Nothing
Intelligence
Sureness
Would
Deep
Husky
Mankind
Twitch
Saying
Huskies

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I watch the clouds as I see them in pomp advancing, pursuing the fallen sun.
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A poet articulating the dreads and horrors of our time is necessary in order to make readers understand what is happening, really understand it, not just know about it but feel it: and should be accompanied by a willingness on the part of those who write it to take additional action towards stopping the great miseries which they record.
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blue bead on the wick, there's that in me that burns and chills, blackening my heart with its soot, I think sometimes not Apollo heard me but a different god.
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One of the obligations of the writer is to say or sing all that he or she can, to deal with as much of the world as becomes possible to him or her in language.
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I believe every space and comma is a living part of the poem and has its function, just as every muscle and pore of the body has its function. And the way the lines are broken is a functioning part essential to the life of the poem.
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The vast silence of Buddha overtakes and overrules the oncoming roar of tragic life that fills alleys and avenues it blocks the way of pedicabs, police, convoys.
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There's in my mind a... turbulent moon-ridden girl or old woman, or both, dressed in opals and rags, feathers and torn taffeta, who knows strange songs but she is not kind.
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But for us the road unfurls itself, we don't stop walking, we know there is far to go.
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Breathe the sweetness that hovers in August.
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In the dark I rest, unready for the light which dawns day after day, eager to be shared. Black silk, shelter me. I need more of the night before I open eyes and heart to illumination. I must still grow in the dark like a root not ready, not ready at all.
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Mediocrity is perhaps due not so much to lack of imagination as to lack of faith in the imagination, lack of the capacity for this abandon.
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In certain ways writing is a form of prayer.
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Insofar as poetry has a social function it is to awaken sleepers by other means than shock.
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I like to find what's not found at once, but lies within something of another nature, in repose, distinct.
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Praise the invisible sun burning beyond the white cold sky, giving us light and the chimney's shadow.
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Every day, every day I hear enough to fill a year of nights with wondering.
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Mountain, mountain, mountain, marking time. Each nameless, wall beyond wall, wavering redefinition of horizon.
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Wear scarlet! Tear the green lemons off the tree! I don't want to forget who I am, what has burned in me, and hang limp and clean, an empty dress -
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Teachers at all levels encourage the idea that you have to talk about things in order to understand them, because they wouldn't have jobs, otherwise. But it's phony, you know.
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In June the bush we call alder was heavy, listless, its leaves studded with galls, growing wherever we didn't want it.
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