“What a Beautiful Bouquet!”

 

1. Yellow roses line the rusted gate, a perforated perimeter that encloses my great Nana Tafoya’s house. Dizzying waves of perfume like sweet voices fill my nose. Her stained glass door cracks open: Jeopardy reruns and pozole made this morning. 

 

2. My chemistry partner, Armando Rivas, stands in the middle of the Junior commons with stiff legs, holding neon daisies wrapped in plastic. “Will you go to homecoming with me?” I smile and look to the stained carpet, thinking of how to say yes.

 

3. In the Trader Joe’s flower section a woman in a wicker hat approaches me as I look distraught in my choice of what flowers to buy for my dining room table. She advises me to buy a bunch of daffodils, still just buds. “They are going to bloom yellow,” she smiles, grabbing her own. Cutting them a fresh stem, I place them in a seafoam green vase I found at Goodwill. Two days later, a gentle beam of yellow in the corner of my room. 

 

4. My dad’s funeral. White roses. A black casket. 

 

5. I find a flattened and dried pansy on page 63 in my Mom’s copy of Something Borrowed by Emily Griffin. I tuck it back into the book's spine, scooting it up onto the shelf. 

 

6. We take the District Line 25 stops from Mile End to Kew Gardens, stopping to get bagels and cream cheese for the long ride. Today, it is the 25th annual Orchid Festival, showcasing displays of orchids from all over Indonesia. I suck in a heavy humid air as I trace the constructed arch of purple splatter orchids. There are at least 4,000 species of plants found on the islands of Indonesia. My favorite is the Titan Arum, or Amorphophallus titanum, is better known as ‘corpse flower’: it produces the scent of rotting flesh while in bloom. 

 

7. My Nana Honey entered me into an art competition as its prize was four tickets to the Santa Fe Opera. Our prompt is to paint on folding paper fans. I decided to paint the hollyhocks that tower along my bedroom window, coloring the abode buildings of downtown. Winning the 5th grade age group, I received four tickets to see Madame Butterfly. My Nana got to wear her mauve silk shawl with tassels that drip down. 

 

8. My dad picks off a honeysuckle from the bush next to our driveway. The cream flower looks so small in his palm. Squatting down, he pinches the bottom tip and pulls out a stem from inside the flower. A droplet of honey bursts through. Licking it, he smiles through sunglasses and hands one to me. That afternoon I ate 7 honeysuckles, placing them in a line on my dad’s stomach. Grass stains bleed into denim as we lay in the front yard, calling out the clouds in the sky.