For more than 40 years, W.S. Merwin and his wife, Paula, have been restoring 19 acres of agricultural wasteland on the island of Maui. Through three essays that speak of this topic from slightly different angles and multiple poems, Merwin explains how this land came to him and why he's spent decades planting hundreds of species of palm trees, along with a vast assortment of other plants, on this acreage.
From an early age, Merwin has loved trees and gardening. He writes, "For the person who has arrived at gardening at whatever age, it is an enchantment, all of it, from the daydreaming to the digging, the heaving, the weeding and watching and watering, the heat, and the stirrings at the edges of the days." Augmenting Merwin's descriptive verse and prose are numerous full-color photographs by Larry Cameron, of many species of palm trees and beautiful close shots of various plants and flowers found throughout what is now known as the Merwin Conservancy. The overall effects are majestic, evocative and reminiscent of the French story The Man Who Planted Trees by Jean Giono. Merwin writes, "after an age of leaves and feathers/ someone dead/ thought of this mountain as money/ and cut the trees/ that were here in the wind/ ...but the trees have risen one more time/ and the night wind makes them sound/ like the sea that is yet unknown...." What Is a Garden? is a tribute to one couple's dedication to give back to the earth far more than they've received. --Lee E. Cart, freelance writer and book reviewer