British/United States, (1923-1997)
Song for Ishtar
- The moon is a sow
- and grunts in my throat
- Her great shining shines through me
- so the mud of my hollow gleams
- and breaks in silver bubbles
- She is a sow
- and I a pig and a poet
- When she opens her white
- lips to devour me I bite back
- and laughter rocks the moon
- In the black of desire
- we rock and grunt, grunt and
- shine.
© estate of Denise Levertov. O Taste and See: New Poems. New York: New Directions (1964).
Her Judgement
- I love my own Humans and their friends,
- but let it be said,
- that my litters may heed it well,
- their race is dangerous.
- They mock the race of Swine, and call
- “swinish” men they condemn.
- Have they not appetites? Do we
- plan for slaughter to fill our troughs?
- Their fat ones, despised, waddle large-footed,
- their thin ones hoard
- inedible discs and scraps
- called “money.” Us they fatten,
- us they exchange for this;
- and they breed us not that our life
- may be whole, pig-life
- thriving alongside dog-life, bird-life,
- grass-life, all
- the lives of earth-creatures,
- but that we may be devoured. Yet,
- it’s not being killed for food
- destroys us. Other animals
- hunt one another. But only Humans,
- I think, first corrupt their prey
- as we are corrupted, stuffed with temptation
- until we can’t move,
- crowded until we turn on each,
- our name and nature abused.
- It is their greed
- overfattens us.
- Dirt we lie in
- is never unclean as their minds,
- who take our deformed lives
- without thought, without
- respect for the Spirit Pig.
© estate of Denise Levertov. Pig Dreams: Scenes from the Life of Sylvia. Woodstock, VT: Countryman Press (1981).
Her Secret
- In the humans’ house
- fine things abound:
- furniture, rugs by the hearth,
- bowls and pitchers, freezer and fridge,
- closets of food, baskets of apples,
- the Musical Saw on which
- my He-human plays
- the songs I dream…
- In my neat A-fram
- they think there is nothing,
- only the clean straw of my bed.
- But under the floor I gather
- beautiful tins, nutshells, ribbons,
- shining buttons, the thousand baubles
- a pig desires.
- They are well hidden.
- Piglets shall find one day
- an inheritance of shapes,
- textures, mysterious substances —
- Rubber! Velvet! Aluminum! Paper!
- Yes, I am founding,
- stick by stick,
- wrapper by wrapper,
- trinket, toys —
- Civilization!
© estate of Denise Levertov. Pig Dreams: Scenes from the Life of Sylvia. Woodstock, VT: Countryman Press (1981).
About the Poet
Denise Levertov, (1923-1997) was a British born poet who became a naturalized US citizen in 1956. She wrote in a style that has been described by some as “deceptively matter-of-fact.” Her poetry often voiced concerns with activism, feminism, social issues and her inclination towards humanitarianism.
Levertov was, for a time, poetry editor of both The Nation magazine and Mother Jones Magazine. From 1982 to 1993, she taught at Stanford University. [DES-6/03]