At a time when much American poetry has become self-conscious, exploring the psyche almost to the point of narcissism, Philip Levine, one of our finest poets, continues to write poetry that explores the relation between self and other, between the personal and social worlds. His poetic ancestors are the most vulnerable and feeling Spanish surrealists, Vallejo and Hernandez, and he uses many of their poetic devices in his work: the catalogue, repetition, and the interrogative. Levine is also a born story-teller, and he uses his narrative gifts in his latest book, The Names of the Lost, to name, to call back, the metaphoric and literal dead, to tell their stories, stories which they could not tell themselves. (p. 241)

A number of poems serve as dedications to political revolutionaries, those who have lost their lives in causes not yet won; Levine cries out for explanations, a sense of...