Reviews
In this starkly honest yet poignant collection, Tom Greening shows once again the poetic power of illumination. For Tom unveils for us an intimacy that cannot be matched by theories or scientific reports; his heart and his gut are the investigators, and his pleas, cries, and bemusements are his findings. We may not recognize it at first but Tom is giving voice not just to his own ungraspable trajectory but to the trajectory of every one of us as we age; and to the extent he elucidates that, he gives us all a little more light, a little more compassion, and a little more levity with which to carry on, and sometimes to thrive.
Kirk Schneider, PhD, author of Awakening to Awe and The Depolarizing of America: A Guidebook for Social Healing
It is with honor and lamentation that I write these words. Dr. Greening once paved the way for me, simply by being himself and uttering the phrase “existential shattering.” I knew instantly that my life wouldn’t ever be the same and that his wisdom lit a torch on a path I would eventually walk. This book, with his beauty, humor, honesty and frank look at death, will also light a path and lead the way for so many of us who will eventually traverse the path Dr. Greening is currently walking. I imagine that someday, when I reach this point of my life, I will return to this book of poetry to find Dr. Greening, once again, ready to walk me home.
Lisa Xochitl Vallejos, PhD
President, The Humanitarian Alliance and Board Chair, Rocky Mountain Humanistic Counseling & Psychological Association
The raw honesty of his slow, struggling walk into the void (death) is a beautiful, yet painful dance between acceptance and rage. Through witty irreverence, sarcasm, and longing appreciation, Tom expresses his fatigue of aging and the feeling of being suspended somewhere between meaningful living with what time remains and being dead without knowing yet know it. The struggle is real; will you accept his invitation to accompany him, and yourself, to stare into the void?
Michael Moats, PsyD, Co-Editor, Capturing Shadows: Poetic Encounters Along the Path of Grief & Loss and Our Last Walk: Using Poetry for Grieving and Remembering Our Pets
From the moment we take our first breath, the Grim Reaper looms, chasing us through life as we desperately maneuver to outwit our finitude as if death itself is the antithesis of life. Into the Void cleverly embraces the vestiges of life as one move through the processes of ageing to in extremis. This book poetically expresses a much-needed antidote to the current fears of dying: It holds the promise of a creative and joyful humanism even till death us do part.
Nathaniel Granger, Jr., PsyD – Past President, Society for Humanistic Psychology (American Psychological Association, Division 32); Editor, University Professors Press
For 60 years, Tom has been a faithful steward to humanistic psychology, shaping the literature through his 38 year tenure as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology, and, during his half-century at Saybrook University, inspiring the minds and careers of several generations of graduate students who would go on to become some of the most impactful contributors to the field. All along, Tom’s poetry has explicated his deeply lived and experienced journey. His prose has evoked so many disparate reactions over the years: depth of heartfelt and sincere emotional resonances, delight, joy, love, fear, terror, grief, frustration, and outright rejection—all of which Tom received and accepted in his role as provocateur and artist. And now, in the twilight of his days, Tom continues to guide and inspire by sharing his poetic experiences of decline, decay, and impending death with his distinctive wit and wry humor, and with resistance, denial, and, ultimately, acceptance. We are greatly indebted to Tom for his lifetime of lovingly shepherding the words and ideas of humanistic psychology since its inception. Now his most personal words challenge us to face our ultimate destiny, our shared human fate with resolute awareness, courage, and serenity.
Shawn Rubin, PsyD
Clinical Professor of Psychology, George Washington University
Past-President, Society for Humanistic Psychology (APA Division 32
Past-Editor in Chief, Journal of Humanistic Psychology
As with the ancient and elegant tradition of Jisei, the Japanese Death poem, Tom Greening’s collection of verse, Into the Void, is a deeply personal farewell to life. Like his earlier works, the poet weaves together pithy observations with heartrending longings, for one more day in the light. The practice of Jisei is an effort to show one’s mind just as they are, at the very end. This is such a gift from a respected Elder in the lineage of our humanistic psychology tradition, to show us his existential mind, just as it is… near the very end.
Gina Belton PhD, Thanatologist and Psychology faculty at Saybrook University
