The Language of Flowers

by Vanessa Diffenbaugh

the scent like a cloud

the hazy syrup of my dreams;

I felt strangely forgiving.

I was able to feel tenderness toward their crime.

the Dictionary of Flowers and Peterson Field Guide to Pacific States Wildflowers,

“This is it, you know,” she said. “Your life starts here. No one to blame but yourself from here on out.”

the dusty summer hills

Meals were served at regular hours, I slept under two blankets, and no one pretended to love me.

I didn’t like listening to people breathe.

Meredith kept a running list of my deficiencies in her appointment book and read them to the judge like criminal convictions. Detached. Quick-tempered. Tight-lipped. Unrepentant. I remembered every word she said.

The white was clean and new, and I liked that it had belonged to no one before me.

I found a surprising lack of newness.

lantana, bougainvillea, potato vine, and nasturtium—

I wanted to be alone, and to be surrounded by flowers.

for the first time, my flowers offered no reassurance.

“These flowers are starwort,” she said. “Starwort means welcome.

Daisy means innocence,

“There’s rosemary; that’s for remembrance.

columbine, desertion; holly, foresight; lavender, mistrust.”

“That’s an almond tree. Its spring blossoms are the symbol of indiscretion—

“Sunflowers?” I asked, surprised. False riches.

Doing as I was told had never been a guarantee that I would get what I was promised.

I had rarely been spoken to as if I was capable of understanding another’s experience.

Renata placed a book in front of me, titled Sunflower Weddings. I thought of an appropriate subtitle: How to Begin a Marriage Steeped in the Values of Deceit and Materialism.

She knew her customers by name and chose flowers for each without direction.

With money in my backpack, the city felt new.

He told me yesterday he’s old enough to have given up on God and come back around.”

Periwinkle, I thought, tender recollections.

“You know, now that I think about it, she’s never really been a happy woman.” He laughed to himself. “But she was passionate. And smart. And interested. She always had an opinion, even about things she knew nothing about. I miss that.”

The effect was like fireworks, dizzying and grand.

mums and periwinkle, truth and tender recollections?

“I love them, but I can only handle them in small doses.

I wanted to spend my life choosing flowers for perfect strangers, my days steadily alternating between the chill of the walk-in and the snap of the register.

She wanted sunlight in flowers, just in case it rained.

Mistletoe. I surmount all obstacles.

“Okay,” I said finally, because I knew it was the fastest way to end the conversation

“It’s Sunday. On Sunday we go to the farmers’ market.”

“Say thank you,” Elizabeth said, but my mouth was full of grapes.

“The language of flowers is nonnegotiable,

Snapdragon. Presumption.

“I’m single but don’t want to be.”

Cactus, she told me, her eyes taunting, meant ardent love,

Heliotrope, she said. Devoted affection.

the common thistle, which symbolizes misanthropy.

“Common thistle is everywhere,” she said. “Which is perhaps why human beings are so relentlessly unkind to one another.”

The solid form of the chair on which I sat began to liquefy.

The more I read, the more I felt my understanding of the universe slip away from me.

Columbine symbolized both desertion and folly; poppy, imagination and extravagance. The almond blossom, listed as indiscretion in Elizabeth’s dictionary, appeared in others as hope and occasionally thoughtlessness. The definitions were not only different, they were often contradictory. Even common thistle—the staple of my communication—appeared as misanthropy only when it wasn’t defined as austerity.

peony, anger but also shame.

If peony could be misinterpreted, how many times, to how many people, had I misspoken? The thought made my stomach turn.