In his first two books, Levine was somewhat traditional in form and relatively constrained in expression. Beginning with "They Feed They Lion", typically Levine's poems are free-verse monologues tending toward trimeter or tetrameter. The music of Levine's poetry depends on tension between his line-breaks and his syntax. The title poem of Levine's book "1933" (1974) is an example of the cascade of clauses and phrases one finds in his poetry. Other collections include "The Names of the Lost", "A Walk with Tom Jefferson", "New Selected Poems," and the National Book Award-winning "What Work Is".