Philip Levine was an American poet born in 1928 in Detroit. He experienced the Great Depression of the 1930s and the wars of the mid 20th century. His personal history often played a role in his poetry. One of his best-known collections is They Feed They Lion.
‘You Can Have It’ is a poem about a man’s loss of enthusiasm towards life and his desire to regain the things and people that made it more colorful. The poem conveys this message through the persona’s narrative, set in Detroit in the year 1948.
My brother comes home from work
and climbs the stairs to our room.
I can hear the bed groan and his shoes drop
one by one. You can have it, he says.
‘The Simple Truth’ by Philip Levine is a thoughtful narrative poem that explores life’s “simple truths” and how fundamental they are to our understanding of the world.
I bought a dollar and a half's worth of small red potatoes,
took them home, boiled them in their jackets
and ate them for dinner with a little butter and salt.
Then I walked through the dried fields
‘They Feed They Lion’ by Philip Levine is a powerful poem that visualizes a scene of apocalyptic proportions. It was inspired by the aftermath of the 1967 Detroit riots.
Out of burlap sacks, out of bearing butter,
Out of black bean and wet slate bread,
Out of the acids of rage, the candor of tar,
Out of creosote, gasoline, drive shafts, wooden dollies,
‘An Extraordinary Morning’ by Philip Levine is a moving poem that exalts and admires the brotherly love shared between two laborers enjoying being off the clock.
Two young men—you just might call them boys—
waiting for the Woodward streetcar to get
them downtown. Yes, they’re tired, they’re also
dirty, and happy. Happy because they’ve
‘What Work Is’ by Philip Levine attempts to reconcile the speaker’s perceptions of what work is versus the tormenting experience of waiting for it.
We stand in the rain in a long line
waiting at Ford Highland Park. For work.
You know what work is—if you’re
old enough to read this you know what
‘Animals Are Passing From Our Lives’ by Philip Levine is a thoughtful piece about the treatment of all living things. It was written in the mid-1960s during protests over the Vietnam War in the United States.
‘Belle Isle, 1949’ by Philip Levine is a poem about a series of moments from a speaker’s youth. He swims in the Detroit River and then returns to his life.
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