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Francesco Levato

Marginal  State, 2006

Poems by Francesco Levato
64 pp., 5 1/4" x 8 1/4",
perfect-bound paperback
ISBN: 1-933126-24-8

To schedule Francesco Levato for readings, lectures, or other literary events
see www(dot)francescolevato(dot)com.

• Author Profile - click here to expand profile

  • Francesco Levato is the founding editor of the literary journal Ink and Ashes ::
    a journal of the senses. Some of his work has appeared in Witness: Anthology
    of Poetry  (Serengeti Press); Out of Line; Poets Against the War; Voices in
    Wartime; Snow Monkey; Poems Niederngasse; and after hours. His awards include
    a poetry fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center.

Review Comments:

Francesco Levato writes with an urgency that will pull the covers off your eyes and ears. He is
another Ginsberg appealing to America's soul. Wake Up! Here are twenty-one "hard" poems
with a tenderness woven into lines of violence. The women in Levato's poems are survivors.
A blues tint shadows many of the pages of Marginal State. Levato's urban silhouettes are
memories waiting for morning light.
                - E. Ethelbert Miller, director, African American Resource Center, Howard University

These poems are hard to grapple with at times because they examine the familiar landmarks
of our culture - advertising, television, Coca=Cola, patriotism - with a critical eye, juxtaposing
our friendly constructions with a despair of poverty, the crippling loneliness of isolation, and the
amoral machinery of capitalism. These poems . . . push us away from the center of our culture
and make us question who we are when we strip away the half-truths we so readily live with.
                - Todd Heldt, author of Before You Were a Prophet

Sometimes Francesco Levato writes of common things in a most uncommonly touching way.
Other times he writes stunning original insights and feelings in plain speak.
                - Charlie Newman, author of deadmachinecity

In Marginal State,  Francesco Levato's well-crafted and sensual poems take the reader on
a courageous exploration through despair and isolation, from this county to Italy via England,
then full circle back to America, and hope, by the collections end.

                - Patricia Wellingham-Jones, Ph.D.

Contents - Click Table of Contents to see the story titles

• Table of Contents
  •   Drums
  •   03   Kimono Tattoo
  •   05   Blood and Oil
  •   07   Fourth and Goal
  •   09   An Act of Faith
  • 011   Wake the Fuck Up
  • Family Values
  • 015   Made in the USA
  • 017   God, Guns, and Jack
  • 019   Defining Eve
  • 021   Last Call
  • 024   Easy Rider
  • 026   Sleeping on Bones
  • Street Level
  • 031   Urban Renewal
  • 034   The Places In-between
  • 036   Shadows of East End
  • Into the Half Light
  • 041   Rites of Passing
  • 043   Truck Stop a.m.
  • 045   Halogen Drift
  • 047   Singularity
  • Clarity
  • 051   The Impermanence of Concrete
  • 053   Chasing Ghosts
  • 055   Morning Light

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Last modified: 09/30/07