SOURCE: "The True and Earthy Prayer': Philip Levine's Poetry," in Cry of the Human: Essays on Contemporary American Poetry, University of Illinois Press, 1975, pp. 251-65.

In the following essay, Mills traces the development of Levine's themes from On the Edge to Red Dust and They Feed They Lion.

 We live
the way we are
—PL., "The Sadness of Lemons" 

The poetry of Philip Levine, from On the Edge (1963) to his two latest collections, Red Dust (1971) and They Feed They Lion (1972), has always displayed technical skill, a dexterous handling of both formal and, more recently, informal modes, and a command of the resources of diction and rhythm. Yet these aspects of technique seem in a way secondary, absorbed as they are by a central, driving intensity peculiar to this poet's approach. Such intensity leads him to a relentless searching through the events of his life and the lives of...