Philip Levine

"I'm saying look, here they come, pay attention. Let your eyes transform what appears ordinary, commonplace, into what it is, a moment in time, an observed fragment of eternity."
Philip Levine


"I'm afraid we live at the mercy of a power, maybe a God, without mercy. And yet we find it, as I have, from others."
Philip Levine

I like these poems. I think Levine's poem are very teachable and easy to read.
"Animals Are Passing From Our Lives" is such a good poem to me. I like the simple nature of a pig being taken to market. I do feel sorry for the pig because it sees "pudgy white fingers that shake out the intestines like a hankie." Watching another animal being handled in that manner would be upsetting.

"Fear and Fame" reminded me of a guy I dated in Macon who worked at a Chemical plant. He worked with acid and other chemicals in huge tubs. When the guy talks about "a gallon of hydrochloric steaming from the wide glass mouth" brought back memories of the smell of the chemicals. I remember leaning over the acid tank wanting to throw objects into to see what would happen. It is another world when you work in factories like that in the poem.