Seraphina Sullivan.
The Secret Language of Flowers.
Valley Regional Hospital.
Now
Stella stood behind Grace near the registration desk at the hospital. It was very busy and everyone was sitting in chairs, two chairs between them for the safety of distance, circles on the floor to space out waiting lines. Grace got Stella registered and took some hand sanitizer from the pump on the counter. It was early Friday afternoon, the last lurch to the weekend. Grace took a number and they sat down to wait. Stella was woozy from the pill Nurse Calvin had given her before they left. She was pleased about the tranquillizer. Hospitals disturbed her. Dianne had been insisting on coming with them. Stella didn’t mind but Nurse Calvin did. The two were still arguing when she left with Grace.
Grace wrote in a notebook, looking away and then back, carefully writing a few lines. Her handwriting was elegant, each letter carefully created, each word intentional, each word summoned. Grace knew Stella was watching her, that she didn’t want to draw. Every day she was sketching less and less, thinking more and more. Grace’s handwriting reminded Stella of Cynthia, of the postcard. Cynthia floated about in her mind now, that seashell Stella had stored her in open, whatever else was tucked away inside slow to come out.
Grace smiled. She spoke to Stella without looking up from her page. “Maybe you should write some poetry, Stella.”
Stella thought about her mother and the poems that died with her. Stella would rather read poetry, see the poetry around her. And in this place, the sad poems, the elegies, the ballads, the sonnets, were all walking about.
There was a hum. It was in Stella’s throat. Grace’s hand stopped moving, suspended in mid-air, the writing incomplete. She didn’t mention Stella’s humming, and when the sound stopped, Grace continued writing. She had told Stella that most of her poems were about her only child, her son. About life as a single parent, how this changes you. Also, poems about being exhausted. A few times she had read poems at the centre, during open mic nights, when residents who wrote poetry read their work, or their favourite poems by famous poets. Stella and Dianne enjoyed these evenings.
Right now, Stella was tired, tired and sore. There was a loud beating. It was a vein in her temple. Her hands went clammy. Grace patted her arm. “You’re here for some tests, Stella. They were scheduled for you a few weeks ago. To find out what’s going on. Do you remember? I know tapering off the medication has been problematic.”
Did someone call her name? Stella looked around. Grace looked up and watched Stella. But there were only people sitting on chairs, sad people, fat people, tired people, angry children, sick children. Stella heard her mother’s voice, calling her name, reading to her, Elizabeth Bishop:
The waiting room was bright
and too hot. It was sliding
beneath a big black wave,
another and another.
Stella touched a page of Grace’s notebook; there were scribbles where she had crossed out words. She was sketching now, some delicate flowers in a vase. Violets.
“Violets symbolized everlasting love and remembrance to the Victorians. And mysticism. A diminutive flower that packs a punch, hey? Want me to read a bit?”
Stella touched Grace’s hand. Grace began:
There was so much you let go of, for the next day.
But all those next days chained
in a garland
of lost days around your neck,
the relentless routine of each day
kept you captive.
Grace paused, took a sip of the stuffy waiting room air and held it for a few seconds, then exhaled the words:
These violets are for you, standing
on the bus,
biting your lip,
wondering how time vanished,
leaving small lines beside your eyes and mouth,
A story etched into flesh.
Grace licked her lips and continued:
You were so busy taking
care of people while
the relentless routine of each day
kept you captive.
Deep breath in. Grace inhaling the waiting room. Exhaling living words:
Now you see life was drawing
a story on your body the entire time,
your skin and bone and muscle remembering
all those days,
all your wishes and dreams.
Pause.
These violets are for you, so you’ll remember:
the shape of days can change.
Yelling.
The stories you read on your face are
stories without endings.
May these small flowers remind you how
the shape of days can change
How the stories you read on your face are
stories without endings.
Hollering.
These flowers are for you to hold
when you cast the garland from your neck
and find how easily it breaks.
The poetry died.
There was shouting and fuss near the main entrance as a woman barged in, skinny as a stick of uncooked spaghetti, black braids flying. She wore muddy hiking boots and a flowery sundress. It was a strange combination. The woman looked familiar to Stella. She didn’t get a ticket, a number, to wait her turn.
“Listen to me. How many times do I have to say I don’t have time to sit here and wait all day for goddamn blood tests. I washed my hands so many times I got skeleton hands. You’re making me into the living dead. My truck’s been parked out there for two hours. I have places to be. Have you ever heard of the three sisters? Or Lucretia rising misty from the foam?” Then a horrible mewling sobbing.
Grace put her pen down on her notebook in her lap. “Oh Seraphina, she must be having a hard time. I heard they put her daughter in foster care. I think she’s about thirteen now.”
Thirteen, a magic age when life collapses, Stella thought. When you realize life is not the rhapsody your mother talked about, that there never will be a rhapsody.
Seraphina, railing in front of them, seemed to be living proof
