A Tribute to d.a. levy & the Cleveland Poets
d.a. levy (October 29, 1942 - November 24, 1968), born Darryl Allan Levy, was an American artist, poet and alternative publisher active during the 1960s, based in Cleveland, Ohio. levy described himself as the Lake Erie "toilet lama".
Biographylevy was born to Joseph J. and Carolyn Levy on Cleveland's near West side. Toward the end of his high school years and later, after a short stint in the Navy, levy decided to read everything and write everything, and lose himself in the search for infinity. He later found a creative outlet in publishing on a small printing press. During this time he also discovered an important spiritual outlet in Buddhism, though Jewish by birth.
levy published his own and others' works, printed on his hand press, or in mimeographed editions through his Renegade Press and Seven Flowers Press. His intense awareness of the gritty and burgeoning art scene of Cleveland, which included drugs and sex, and his need to express this scene which he felt a way of attaining enlightenment, meant that he was not welcome in the political environment. In 1966, he was indicted for distributing obscene poetry to minors. He was arrested again in 1967, and his pressing materials confiscated, prompting a benefit reading on May 14, 1967 on the Case Institute of Technology campus which featured such figures as Allen Ginsberg, Tuli Kupferberg and the Fugs.
levy died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head on November 24, 1968 at the age of 26. He was cremated, and half his ashes are buried in Whitehaven Cemetery in Mayfield Heights, Ohio. Some ashes remain in the charge of Cleveland Heights artist George Fitzpatrick, who intends to work them into a calligraphic painting of levy's words.
There is a no longer fashionable conjecture in a book by Mike Golden that levy was murdered by the Cleveland police or local government because of his anti-establishment writings. This controversy died down, shortly upon publication, and is only maintained by those far-removed from the poetry community. It is scoffed at by 'levites', and those who knew levy first-hand reject the idea of anything but a suicide.
levy often talked about suicide. Russ Salamon, friend of levy and fellow Cleveland poet, gave levy large stacks of books, replenishing them when necessary, knowing levy would finish the texts, and therefore remain a little while longer on this earth. For the last three years of his life, levy was fond of saying he would like leave the city, the country, and to go to "Israel" (is real). Mike Golden's essay asserts that "there is strong evidence that he was not alone when he died," placing most emphasis on the way levy's body was posed upon being found, levy would have had to completely relax all the toes in his feet while clutching the gun with them, to make the gun go off. Then again, Golden backs away from the assertion: couldn't a true Buddhist do that?
Published works
levy is most known for The North American Book of the Dead, Cleveland Undercovers, and Suburban Monastery Poem, and in the last years of the 20th century his Tombstone as a Lonely Charm found a new following.
His earliest writings were almost all in lowercase, and would appear to some to be lacking in focus. In his mimeographs of his writings (which could be considered an early form of zine), the poetry is sometimes misspelled. This could be style, error or perhaps it boils down to mimeo method, as correcting the stencils was laborious.
As levy got more involved in both Buddhism and Cleveland, his poems got more playful at times, used spelling "mistakes" and syntax "errors" carrying multiple meanings, and other effects, and did not shy away from long lines of capital letters.
An example of levy's work
Here is a small sample from "Part 2 (The Well)" of The North American Book of the Dead. Note the nouns placed next to each other with no verbs, and contrasting loaded images with the ordinary, the alignment of the text on the surface, and the use of caps.
it disappears when i know i am there
images
color images
negative images
trucks cars cunts flowers birds
light jade ivory sculpture
places no-places temples thighs
cities casts flashes
roses clouds eye EYE
chaos
NOT THAT NOT THAT
Notes
1. ^ Kaufman, Alan (1999), p. 23.
References
* levy et al. ukanhavyrfuckinciti bak collected/edited by rjs, GHOST PRESS CLEVELAND (t.l. kryss) Reprinted 2007 by Salamon, Russ xerox of the original
* Kaufman, Alan , Griffin, S.A. The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1999.
* Golden, Mike, ed. The Buddhist Third Class Junkmail Oracle: The Art and Poetry of d.a.levy (with an "investigative essay" by Golden). New York: Seven Stories Press, 1999.
SOURCE: Wikipedia
The Buddhist Third Class Junk Mail Oracle: The Art and Poetry of DA Levy
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Release Date: 12/31/1969
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d.a.levy & the mimeograph revolution
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Release Date: 04/19/2007
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--d.a levy
cleveland, i gave youthe poems that no one ever
wrote about you
and you gave me
NOTHING...
cleveland i gave you
poems that no one else had time
to write
& you arrested me
AND I DON'T EVEN CARE
(39)
best place to find books by da levy and other cleveland poets?
DETRITUS BOOKS.
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NEW! (June 2008)
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in the days unbornyou will find my brothers
ARMED with words you havent
even dreamed of.
Cleveland
you will move
or be plowed over-
eaten by vultures
like a corpse
digested
& slowly
change ...
--d.a. levy
working out the problems of the universethinking weird thoughts
writing paranoid poems about the police
nothing to do except
change the kitty litter, take out the garbage
-- d.a. levy
from The North American Book of the Dead
short bios
- d.a. Levy.
Born October 29, 1942. Died November 24, 1968.
Multi-talented Poet, Publisher, Printer, Painter, Proselytizer
and cult figure who committed suicide at the age of 26. - Jau Billera.
New York transplant.
Edited the poetry magazine PODIUM.
He hosted a radio show in Cleveland.
Committed suicide in Las Vegas in1981. - Kent Taylor.
Born November 8, 1940, New Castle, PA.
Medical Research, Poet, Sprinter.
Lives in San Francisco, CA. - Russell Atkins.
Born February 25, 1926.
Poet, Composer, Theorist, Musician,
Editor of Freelance Magazine. Lives
in Cleveland. - Russell Salamon.
Poet on the scene to the mid 60's then
became a member of the armed forces.
Lives in Los Angeles. - Tom Kryss.
Born in the late 1940's.
Poet, Publisher of Black Rabbit Press.
Artist known for iconic silkscreen rabbits. - Geoffrey Cook.
Entered the Cleveland poetry scene
in the mid to late 60's. A Poet who
later became involved in mail art and
multi-media performances. Lives in
Berkeley, CA. - RJS.
Born in 1947 or 1948. Poet, Publisher,
currently lives outside Cleveland. - Jim Lowell.
Born in Cleveland in 1932, died in 2004.
Opened his legendary Asphodel Bookstore
in 1963 and was the proprietor until his death.
a belated touché for d.a.levy
you can watch the ones whodidn't move fast enough
they are dying
& they are called Poets
-- d.a.levy
Antares guided you home
the month
of the day
of the dead
1968
when you stumbled
into your shadow
no one was quick enough
to keep the sun
overhead
in Cleveland
two thousand miles and
sixteen Novembers
west
the night still yields
reluctantly
i only see
what your shadow covered
at noon
a bloody flag
left as a bookmark
inscribed fuck it goodbye
~kent taylor
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to jim lowel's goldfishby d.a.levy
there is little or nothing
of the minds nightwork
so there is pretending & amusement
a goldfish in a toilet bowl
a piece of the captured sun
the heart of a melons wisdom
if of the Spanish marauders
a ripping up of alabaster by its iron roots
carries this treasure off to store in a
galleon that is to die young
instead, i anchor him with old memories
and change his water by day
he thinks it is the tide
This page is dedicated toJim Lowell and his hugely
influential Asphodel Bookstore
which served as a nucleus to
the Cleveland Poetry Scene.
levy links
- deep cleveland - levy lives!
- A literary e-zine in the spirit of beat poet d.a. levy
- levy chronology
- levy chronology
- d.a.levy publications - a bibliography
- d.a. levy PUBLICATIONS
Bibliography compiled by Kent Taylor and Alan Horvath - The Works of d. a. levy
- The Works of d. a. levy.
- The d.a. levy Collection at Cleveland Memory
- This growing collection includes reprints and original works of levy's textual and visual art, along with photographs and newspaper clippings - a digital initiative acknowledging levy's historical significance in Cleveland's underground, poetry and alternative press scene, and in keeping with levy's...
- d.a. levy Bibliography&Information
- d.a. levy bibliography including contributions to periodicals includes photos, and other information pertaining to this poet.
- Cleveland Dreams - tribe.net
- A Tribute to the Cleveland Poets Including; d.a. Levy, Russell Atkins, Kent Taylor, Russell...
- D. A. Levy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- D. A. Levy From Wikipedia.
- d.a.levy
- d.a.levy home page.
- d.a. levy - on Flickr
- d.a. levy - images, art, poems
Editorial Reviews
The Buddhist Third Class Junk Mail Oracle: The Art and Poetry of DA Levy (Paperback)
Thirty-one years after he committed suicide in his East Cleveland apartment shortly after his 26th birthday, this legendary beat poet and publisher becomes a bit less mythic with the first widely available selection of his prodigious output. Cult figure levy [sic] was a mainstay of the vital Cleveland poetry scene of the early '60's and became a T-shirted martyr to the burgeoning counterculture, due to the unrelenting prosecution of this penniless poet on obscenity charges by that city's police department. Levy's poetry still retains hard-won integrity within the side-stapled confines of the humble mimeo chapbook, but it now appears, in this crisp new edition, interesting mostly for sociological and historical reasons. The editor's lengthy introduction offers a well-researched look into the poet's short, frantic life, but levy would have been better served by a far smaller selection of his work, which would have made pieces like "Suburban Monastery Death Poem" stand out: "...only ten blocks away/ from my quiet apartment/ with its green ceramic buddhas/ & science fiction books/ unread skin magazines to be cut up for collages...." On the whole, levy's often rapid-fire delivery has enough in common with poetry slam wordslingers to draw comparisons, and some poems parallel the concrete poetics then developing in New York and Europe. Enthusiasts and scholars of the period will welcome this comprehensive look at a local oracle.~Publishers Weekly
Levy was one of those poets who might as well have published his work in samidzat, considering the attentionand cult statushe obtained. An autodidact who spent most of his short life in Cleveland, levy collected his poetry in small chapbooks (most produced on his own photocopier) and obscure underground journals now long forgotten. Editor Golden, a poet and screenwriter, is to be commended for putting together this omnibus volume (including some of the poets artwork) from the complex bibliographic scraps that levywho died under mysterious circumstancesleft behind. Clearly influenced by Guy Debord and the Situationist International (a 1950s updating of the Dadaist movement), levys poetry is a pastiche of personal narrative (i ask . . . / is new Carters Tavern old Carters / Tavern & are the best brews really / at the Harbor Inn?) and political harangue (prophylactics are not / revolutionary / gun control begins in the bathroom) that largely rejects formal literary convention and aims at inducing (rather than conveying) the authors perceptions within the reader. Something of a local celebrity in the late '60s, levy was tried (unsuccessfully) in Cleveland on obscenity charges and was denounced in The Plain Dealer as a drug cultist. Golden provides a good introduction to those unfamiliar with the poets life and career, but, as he admits himself, This book, despite years of pruning, is still too rough to be labeled. Still, its a nice starteven though levy remains more interesting as a character than as a poettoward the increasing attention that eventually will be paid.
~Kirkus Reviews
