Michael Grodesky, PhD

“What is documented, at last, is not the thing itself but the way of seeing—the object infused with the subject. The eye moving over the world like a lover. And so the boundary between self and world is elided, and a bit softened.”
—Mark Doty from Still Life with Oysters and Lemon

“Every way of seeing is also a way of not seeing.”
—Kenneth Burke

The great philosopher Pythagoras was once asked if he was a wise man. He replied humbly, “I am a lover of wisdom.” In that spirit, I am a lover of poetry and photography. My creative work is grounded in the aesthetics of minimalism, linearity, and negative space.

Though my background is as a primary care health provider (now retired), I also have training in the behavioral sciences. Recently, I combined this training with my love of poetry and my expertise in qualitative research to embark on an interesting research project known as a Discourse Tracing.

As a gay man, I am interested in how the aspects of affirmation and assimilation relate to the lived experiences of queer individuals and their communities.

Particularly, I am interested in how these discursive elements have presented themselves in the writings of gay poets over the past decades. Using poetry as “data,” the discourse tracing methodology allows the researcher to trace a particular discourse over a span of time periods at macro, meso and micro levels. Details regarding this research and the plan and progress are presented here in the Research section.

My poetry chapbook, Absence On Water, was released by Bottlecap Press in February of 2026 and an excerpt, along with a link to the full publication is displayed in the Poetry section of this site. Other poetic work, including my first chapbook, Dissimilation, is also included. The Photography section includes a gallery of my work, with links to larger collections.

The Essay section includes short writings of ideas on a variety of subjects mostly related poetry and photography. I have also included a section titled Ethics and Aesthetics which is an evolving explication of personal values related to queer ethics, minimalism as a world view, and the values associated with qualitative research. Welcome to all and thanks for visiting my site!