Levertov, Denise

The Jacob's Ladder with: Ephemera

New York, NY, USA: New Directions, 1961. First Softcover Edition. Softcover. “My black sun, my / Odessa sunflower, / spurs of Tartar gold / ring at your ankles, / you stand taller before me than the ten / towers of Jerusalem. / Your tongue has found / my tongue, peonies / turn their profusion towards / the lamp, it is you that burn there, / the Black Sea sings you awake. / Wake the Violoncellos of Lebanon, / rub the bows with cedar resin, / wake the Tundra horsemen / to hunt tigers. / Your skin / tastes of the salt of Marmora, / the hair of your body casts / its net over me. / To my closed eyes / appears a curved / horizon where darkness / dazzles in your light. Your arms / hold me from falling.”--Denise Levertov, “Song for a Dark Voice,” pg 23. Denise Levertov (1923-1997) was a British-American poet who was deeply influenced by the Black Mountain poets–i.e., Robert Duncan (1919-1988), Robert Creely (1926-2005), and Charles Olson (1910-1970)– and the political milieu of the anti-war/anti-imperialist movements around the Vietnam War. Levertov was as prolific as she was critically lauded, some of her most beloved works include: The Double Image (1946); With Eyes to See the Backs of Our Heads (1959); O Taste and See (1964) [see item #7918]; Candles in Babylon (1982); and Breathing the Water (1987) just to name a few. Offered today is the 1961 collection of poetry The Jacob’s Ladder. Intense, introspective, emotionally visceral, and deeply spiritual, The Jacob’s Ladder is a work that on one hand wears its inspirations on its sleeve, and on the other hand is uniquely and distinctly Levertov. From the collection of scholar, poet and our dear friend Robin Eichele (b. 1941), noted Mimeograph Revolutionary & co-founder (with the late, great John Sinclair [1941-2024]) of the Detroit Artists’ Workshop. We have found and retained, between pgs 16 & 17, two small squares of paper with handwritten notes on sections in both The Jacob’s Ladder, and O Taste and See by Robin Eichele. Trade-format softcover. First softcover edition though not explicated as such at copyright page, presumed first printing though similarly not explicated thereon. In relatively good-to-near-fine condition with moderate wear to fine edges, light smudging, scratching and creasing to front and back covers. Interior in good-to-near-fine condition with moderate discoloration due to age at front & back inner covers and page edges. Good-Near Fine. [Item #7920]

Price: $25.00