A Garden Enclosed

William Blackburn is a professor of English at the University of
Calgary.

This is the third book of poetry by the award-winning Ottawa poet and
writer Marchand. Dealing as it does with the death from cancer of the
author’s wife of 14 years, it is a very moving and very painful book
to read; one can only guess, in all humility, at the courage and love
which the writing of it must have demanded. It is easy to say that
“death is the mother of beauty.” To come through the fire of pain
and loss, to come through all the days and nights when one can only say
“Forgive me. / I no longer have the words / To deal with your dying”
is not quite so simple a matter. To have come through with the clear and
quiet courage shown by Marchand in these poems is an achievement beyond
praise. Lacking the flair for the noisy self-aggrandizement of a Walt
Whitman, Marchand would never say “I am the man, I suffered, I was
there”—but he has certainly earned the right to do so. He has
certainly also earned the gratitude of all those others who must someday
go there, and who will need, and need desperately, his assurance that
courage and love can indeed be stronger than suffering and loss.