Poetry Books

Beyond the Wire

Close Hand Press / 153 Pages / ISBN 9780979806346 Released: June 2016

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Gary Galsworth has had about ten life times worth of adventures and misadventures.  In this collection, he writes frankly and with palpable feeling, utilizing direct lucid poems as vehicles for his incredible experiences.  Violence, romance, blood ties, death - Galsworth lays out his themes with equal parts grit and heart.

Yes Yes

close hand press / 93 pages / isbn 9781453723425 / released: august 2010

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As a kid, I couldn't wait, to get started. There were markers-important starting points, gates-opening to such huge possibilities. And they all arrived in their time, like a parade, a holiday procession. I jumped in, climbed on, drove (or hitch hiked) to them, almost breathless with anticipation. I signed up, fought my way through, said yes enthusiastically. I couldn't wait. It also came to pass that I was turned down, thrown out (or told, politely but unequivocally, to leave)-and once, unexpectedly asked, "Don't you ever shut up?" In the course of events a spiritual teacher even gave me a Buddhist name, "Dainin." "What does that mean, sir?" "It means Great Patience," he said. "But sir, I don't have much patience." "You will," he answered. I couldn't wait. "Yes Yes", a collection of poems written over a number of years, is a voice of this journey. The odd thing is, if you were to ask me to tell you my story, I couldn't find the words. It would be all clues and hints and shadows. Yet this collection has a beating heart, perhaps more than one. The style is varied, but mostly straightforward, even plain... "Cat bones, my bones, share the same old bag. The same sinews tie and work us." The poems also express the wonderment, the simplicity, of Love... "The very last finger kissed to the very tip, and from this very tip I leap into your grey green eyes and they close over me." And of loss... "...can we stay close just now, keep talking, whisper? I will. Lean over here-whisper to me." And of the unembellished joy in living one's story... "Resting against each other out of the sun bound by daydreams, and half closed eyes." And snapshots of that experience... "It's spring and cottonwoods reach to drink the moon as it drifts across a hundred ponds." One hopes that the poems are also a place where the poem and the reader "...disappear into each other."