Garden Walks: Hand in Hand by Gary W. Burns

In Garden Walks: Hand in Hand, poet Gary W. Burns has crafted a beautiful collection that acts as a vivid and meditative appreciation of love between people, and the love of nature.

Burns achieves the semblance of a whole through splitting the collection into four parts: “Colorful Blooms,” “This Backyard Garden,” “Garden Paths,” and “Seasons Cascading.” Each part seems to mirror the constituent parts of a flower’s life – it buds, grows, blooms, and dies. There is a symbiosis between human relationships and nature, exploring love seen through the lens of the natural world.

The most affecting poems are those that seem to break free from the small constraint that the poet has tied to the others, where the poem isn’t as closely tied to the same structure. “Watching Leaves” exudes a sense of love that transcends nature. While there may be falling leaves and these leaves may fall symbolically for some, human love is what blesses it with meaning.

Though the subtitle, “Poems to Relax by,” might suggest something lightweight, that is not at all the case here. Bringing out themes once touched upon by Robert Frost, the poems work both individually, begging to be read in one sitting, and as a rewarding cohesive whole. A finely expressed work, Garden Walks will indeed help the reader relax through its calming appreciation of beauty in all its natural forms.

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