Insofar as poetry has a social function it is to awaken sleepers by other means than shock.
Denise LevertovI thought I was growing wingsโ it was a cocoon. I thought, now is the time to step into the fireโ it was deep water. Eschatology is a word I learned as a child: the study of Last Things; facing my mirrorโno longer young, the newsโalways of death, the dogsโrising from sleep and clamoring and howling, howling.... ("Seeing For a Moment")
Denise LevertovLooking, Walking, Being, I look and look. Looking's a way of being: one becomes, sometimes, a pair of eyes walking. Walking wherever looking takes one. The eyes dig and burrow into the world. They touch, fanfare, howl, madrigal, clamor. World and the past of it, not only visible present, solid and shadow that looks at one looking. And language? Rhythms of echo and interruption? That's a way of breathing. breathing to sustain looking, walking and looking, through the world, in it.
Denise Levertov