Garden Time

Composed as he lost his eyesight, W.S. Merwin’s final and exquisite book brims with longing, loss, and unanswerable questions. In Garden Time, Merwin’s luminous, ethereal voice gently interrogates mortality; at the very end of his life, he sings lovingly to a tireless world––although not without trepidation. When he could no longer see well enough to write, he dictated his poems to his wife, Paula. The result is a book contemplative and delicate, tender and melancholy. In this gorgeous, mindful, and life-affirming book, our greatest poet channels energy from his memories and deep connection to the world so as to remind us that “The only hope is to be the daylight.”