Our theme for the month of June is “snapshots.” Writers were asked to submit a piece with a cover photo that they took or created.
1: Photo Fodder
When I go for walks in the warmer months, I take my phone along in case I spot any flowers worth recording. Crocuses lead to daffodils, which lead to tulips, which lead to irises, which lead to poppies—so far. I’ve lived between Cherry Hill and Heritage Hill long enough to know which house to visit for pale-pink willow blooms, which house to visit for irises of multiple colors, which house to visit for red-orange poppies the size of my hand. When I scroll through my photo library, I find images of past springs and summers and the flowers that seem both familiar and fantastical each time they appear.
2: Travel Memory
Even away from home, I find myself noting local flora as much as architecture. Over a decade ago on a family trip, my aunt taught me to take close-up photos through Queen Anne’s lace and other wildflowers. Now I remember my travels through the flowers I have seen and sometimes recorded: the red of tulips outside a train station in Chicago, the pink of magnolias outside the Gullah museum in Hilton Head, the yellow of the daffodils along the abbey ruins in York.
3: Allergy Trigger
If I haven’t started taking allergy meds by the time the trees bloom, I’m doomed. Lilacs might be lovely to the eyes, but they also make mine water. I cannot wear many perfumes; sweet-pea candles induce headaches. Even the peonies sitting on my windowsill right now are a sight I appreciate best from a distance. Once the trees’ spring flowers turn to summer leaves, I breathe a sigh of relief, because at least now I can actually (sort of) breathe.
4: Clothing Choice
Just as flowers start to cause me to sneeze and cough, I start to wear them more and more on my body. When I wear florals, I feel like myself, so much that I joke that my chosen aesthetic is “aspiring plant.” My closet is full of floral patterns; even my earring collection includes daisies-in-resin and diamonds of white blooms. Last week I peeled off a layer of nail stickers named “Wallflower Frenzy”: you can guess that they didn’t feature polka dots.
5: Feminine Fashion?
When I search for floral dresses, many fashion sites categorize my taste as “classically feminine.” And floral prints have a long, long history in women’s fashion: from plum and lotus hairpins in ancient China, to the botanical swirls of Indian chintz fabric, to the floral details of Venetian and modern lace, flowers have decorated females for centuries. But limiting the design to women limits our view of fashion history: men, too, have chosen to decorate themselves with all sorts of flowers throughout times and cultures. In Tang Dynasty China, men wore silks swirled with peonies; sixteenth and seventeenth-century Ottoman men preferred fabrics decorated with tulips and pomegranates; eighteenth-century European men gilded themselves with elaborately botanical silk brocades. Even in more modern trends, can you imagine a Hawaiian shirt without hibiscus? Flowers are not just feminine; wearing them is a longstanding human tradition of making nature’s beauty a part of our own.
6: Inspiration Source
This spring as the trees budded, I read a book about a woman known for her love of flowers: the poet Emily Dickinson. The pop-culture portrait of Emily pictures her as a shy, shirking wallflower of a woman scribbling in her bedroom. But while the real Emily did prefer solitude and the company of her own family, she was much more likely to be found covered in dirt in her garden, her enormous dog Carlo (likely a Newfoundland or St. Bernard) at her side. Carlo (like her family, like the neighbor children who loved what she baked) would have known that Emily’s hands were just as active as her mind. For many years, the poet’s happiest hours were spent in the woods, searching for wildflowers with her “shaggy Ally”: “But He, the Best Logician, / Refers my clumsy eye – / To just vibrating Blossoms! / An Exquisite Reply!”
7: Plant Practicality
Flowers are, to a plant, immensely practical organs of the body. Typically the facilitators of plant reproduction, flowers link plants to the next generation of their species. For a plant, producing a burst of color is not just beautification: it is a vital part of survival. Then bees and other pollinators help the plants produce fruit and seeds. Perhaps an animal eats the fruit, digests it, and scatters the seeds. Perhaps the plant progresses undisturbed, and it scatters its seeds later in life, through the wind or the helpful hands of a human.Through its flowers, the species lives on into the next season.
8: Garden Product
Any human who has cared for a garden knows that flowers are a sign of food. Cherry blossoms, peach blossoms, apple blossoms, squash blossoms: these are a step in a sequence that leads to harvest. In my own plot, the parsley and thyme plants have already produced flowers, and my housemate and I snip them whenever we spot them. Once a plant flowers, it will spend all its energies on flowering, sending all its nutrients to the petals. But when growing thyme or parsley leaves, not blossoms, the gardener spends her time trying to prevent spots of white or pink.
9: Kitchen Ingredient
Inside the house, I cook and eat my flower harvests: chamomile daisies in tea, squash blossoms in soup, pansies on cocktails, chive blossoms in vinegar. But sometimes even these flowers will not let me forget that they are relatives of the ones that make me sneeze in the spring. When I sprinkle rose or lavender over shortbread or madeleines, the petals leave my palms covered in tiny, itching red marks. Though I’ve learned to use a spoon to protect my hands, I still love the beauty and the flavor of these flowers in my food.
Photo: Chive blossoms, with view of chive blossom vinegar, 6/4/202
Courtney Zonnefeld graduated in 2018 with a degree in writing. She currently lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she works for Eerdmans Books for Young Readers. In her free time, she enjoys reading, baking, and saving up for more herb plants. You can usually find her wandering a farmer’s market, hunting for vintage books, or browsing the tea selection in coffee shops.
