Larry Levis was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Fullbright, and three poetry fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.  Born in Fresno, California, he taught at the University of Missouri, the University of Utah, and Virginia Commonwealth University up until his death, of a heart attack, in 1996.  His last books of verse were The Widening Spell of the Leaves (1991), Elegy (1997), and The Selected Levis (2000).