Denise Levertov is really interesting. When I worked at the publishing house, we published a "Conversations with..." book. It was a collection of interviews and essays. She has strong opinions on poetry and the poet. My favorite poem of hers is below. It always makes me think of Stevie's The Wild Heart album cover...
In Mind
There's in my mind a woman
of innocence, unadorned but
fair-featured and smelling of
apples or grass. She wears
a utopian smock or shift, her hair
is light brown and smooth, and she
is kind and very clean without
ostentation-
but she has
no imagination
And there's a
turbulent moon-ridden girl
or old woman, or both,
dressed in opals and rags, feathers
and torn taffeta,
who knows strange songs
but she is not kind.
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