From the Collection, Being, There
Wind whistled through the narrow slits between
The fencepost’ s long splinters, where there was nothing
That I could see, only a flute’ s sound of nature’ s making
From the long standing in dry prairie air of any
Wooden post and a farmer’ s need to have the post
Stand still long enough that, to my young boy sense
Of things, seemed to be forever. It delighted my eyes
And my fingers to touch some thing that lived
Right there inside where forever might arrive,
And there I’ d go on many days to touch,
To listen, to see that very nothing and hear
That single forever, and on days when I needed to,
That were many, I’ d hold my cheek right there
Where nothing and forever mingled in that way
That wind knew to make audible and to signal,
It seemed maybe only to me, to signal
That if I longed for what was far away
My longing could soothe me, starting at my
Cheek where it touched a body that knew to stand
Still and to wait and to sing, and singing, to weave
Nothing and forever into dancing somewhere
That was nowhere but in that longing.
Grandson of homesteaders, Gary Whited (he/him) grew up on a cattle ranch in eastern Montana in the 1940’ s and 50’ s. When he left the ranch to study philosophy, he had no idea he was about to encounter ancient Greek thinkers who would take him back to the ranch. The kinship he felt between the thought of early Pre-Socratic philosophers and the sense of a profound interconnectedness of all things that he’ d experienced growing up on the prairie intrigued him. His doctoral dissertation explored that kinship and resulted in his first translation of the fragments of Parmenides’ fifth century BCE poem.
Being, There offers his current version of that translation project along with some of his new poems. Whited’ s rendering of this ancient text together with his poems respond to the call from Parmenides to listen to what claims us and speaks to us, and through that deep listening to uncover the presence of Being in each encounter, each moment.
After teaching philosophy for several years at University of Montana, University of Texas and Emerson College in Boston, Gary began to study and practice psychotherapy. Over the years it has become clear to him that the listening that began in the silent presence of fenceposts and the subtleties of the prairie landscape has carried him to the ancient Greek classical voices, to his students in philosophy classes and eventually to his clients in psychotherapy sessions.
Whited has published several essays in journals and anthologies in the fields of philosophy and psychology. He has also lectured and facilitated workshops internationally on the healing of unresolved grief, shame, and trauma.
His first book of poems titled, Having Listened, won the 2013 Homebound Publications Poetry Contest. In 2014 it received a Benjamin Franklin Silver Book Award. Having Listened was translated into Russian and made into a bilingual volume also published by Homebound Publications.
His poems have appeared in journals, including Salamander, Plainsongs, The Aurorean, Atlanta Review, Narrative, The Red Letters and Comstock Review.
Gary currently lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
