Gary Galsworth grew up in the New York City area. After the Marine Corps, he studied painting and filmmaking at the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Chicago. His 16mm films were shown at the Whitney Museum, in New York City.
Shortly after that, Gary left the arts to become a professional plumber. He had been writing poems for nearly 35 years before he showed them to any friend or family member. Within two years of this, in 2010. his first book of poems came out—”Yes Yes.” This was followed in 2016 by “Beyond the Wire,” “Nothing Itself” in 2020, and “The Mole Penthouse” in 2024. He is now writing his fifth book of poems, titled “Nothing Worked … Except Love.”
Gary lives with his wife, Carol, in Providence, Rhode Island. He often visits Hoboken, New Jersey, where Ondine and Daniel, his two grown children, live. He is a lifelong student of meditation.
His poems have been featured in the Alexandria Quarterly, Bittersweet Magazine, Broad River Review, Contemporary Expressions, Mainstreet Rag, Pennsylvania English, Pioneertown, Poydras Review, and many other journals.
Podcast: Gwendolyn interviews Gary.
Yes Yes
Praise for Yes Yes. "The reader will discover in this collection beautiful contemplative poems. Gary Galsworth holds the still center while the cascading events of time find definition in a poet’s moving language."
— Dr. Kathryn Kimball, author of Finding John Keats and Coleridge’s Dreaming Mind
From Gary Galsworth: "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 hitchhiked) 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 Zen teacher even gave me a Buddhist name—’Dainin.’ I asked, ‘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 paradox 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.
One hopes that these poems are also a place where the poet and the reader ‘…disappear into each other.”
Beyond the Wire
Praise for Beyond the Wire. “Gary Galsworth has had about ten lifetimes worth of adventures and misadventures. In this collection, he writes frankly and with palpable feeling about those experiences. Romance, blood ties, death, tea, violence, the closeness of nature—Galsworth lays out his themes with equal parts of grit and heart.”
— Justin Millan Poet and Author
From Gary Galsworth: "Beyond the Wire is the second published poem collection by New York-born poet, plumber, and Zen practitioner, Gary Galsworth. Springing from a life well-observed, his poems resonate with palpable feeling, love, and humor.”
Nothing Itself
Praise for Nothing Itself. “I love these poems … so personal, generous, and human. Just what I need. I find comfort in their joy, humor, and acceptance.”
— Barbara Curry Mulcahy Poet and Author
From Gary Galsworth: “This is my third collection of poems—with a few short stories included. My first collection, ‘Yes Yes,’ came out in 2010. I had been writing for many years before that.
Poetry was just something I did, as the poems came to me. They added up, and I started sharing them with a good friend here and there. One of those friends surprised me when she said, ‘Gar, consider taking your poems more seriously. Not because they are very good, exceptional or prescient. Don’t worry about that stuff. It’s out of our hands. We just do the best we can. Show up for them because you have lived a diverse and engaged life and have something to say worth sharing.’
And so I officially gave recognition to a path I was already on. Accepted and embraced it. I found writing down a poem an intriguing play. They come my way and we engage, an ensemble. My job—stay available and allow them to find their shape and direction in language.
Ironically, getting myself out of the way has a lot to do with letting that happen. I don’t want to mislead you into excessive serendipity.
Some poems show up like leaves floating by on a stream, but others will not go unheard. They break the surface with the energy and determination of a dolphin or a leopard seal.
Out of original ground, nurtured and conditioned, they still retain a mind and journey of their own.”
The Mole Penthouse
Praise for The Mole Penthouse. “Sometimes poetry flows unimpeded from the bottom of the author’s heart. This is the case with Gary Galsworth, and we value him the most for this brutal honesty, for letting us gaze into his inner feelings and see ours reflected as in a looking glass.”
— Esther Aguilera, Poet, Madrid
From Gary Galsworth: “I’m not writing as many poems nowadays, and at times I wonder why? Maybe it’s because there is less pain and struggle than there used to be. Or maybe it’s because pleasure and pain, struggle and harmony, are not so distant from one another anymore. Perhaps the Rockies and Grand Tetons are being smoothed out into the Catskills, as this flow of life passes over them.
Life’s river, at times placid, mirror smooth, at times churning and full of the wild and the wilderness. Yet the source is always the same, a small spring bubbling up out of nowhere in particular, going nowhere in particular, complete in itself. If I can, I want to find a way back to that source.