Candles in Babylon Author:Denise Levertov Denise Levertov’s Candles in Babylon evinces both the inner strength gained by a life of social commitment and the quiet wisdom born of solitude. The seventy-one poems in the book -- ÂÂher first full collection since Life in the Forest (1978) -- are grouped into several thematic sections that explore by turns the subtleties... more » in the shifting balance between our public and private selves, the poet’s voice ranging from the wry satire of her “Pig Dreams” sequence to the resonant grandeur of her six-part “Mass for the Day of St. Thomas Didymus.” Behind it all is the gentle melancholy of the title poem and the poet’s vision of peace.« less