The Language of Flowers

A dictionary of the relationship we share with flowers in India

So deeply are flowers entrenched into our daily lives that they follow us through rituals that symbolise birth and death. And in between the cycle of living they linger in our everyday- a gentle but irreplaceable presence. In this photo essay, we put together a dictionary to define the relationship that flowers have woven with us through time.

A is anticipation

She carries a basketful of anticipation and appeasement for the gods to see her through mathematics, marriage, motherhood and misfortune.

B is a ‘boy cut’

No boy cut is spared a string of malli folded into a lump in a slightly imbalanced declaration of femininity.

C is for courtship

Bouquets for anniversaries, remembered and forgotten. The poorer the memory, the larger the bouquet swells with guilt.

D becomes death

Farewell petals, heavy with symbolism and despair stay afloat on rivers. Lighter for having left the world.

E is so extra

And it rained flowers that day. They dripped off her umbrella, drenched her sari and collected as tender buds in her patharam.

Is her name Malligai? Quite possible.

F is flattered

A girl gave him these sandigai flowers. So he kept them in his pocket, close to his heart.

G is for glory

Glory comes and goes in garlands.

(Afraid to lose their importance, some keep their former glory under lock and key.)

H is a hero

Heroes whose only game is persistence, often rely on clichéd roses

Smothering their lovers with a lack of imagination

Why has no one informed them of a wider floral universe of persuasion?

One where romance is a delicate balance of petals- ‘loves-me-loves-me-not’.

One where no one needs a hero,

because we all save ourselves.

I is impressionist

Monet visits Madurai on some nights.

J is just jasmine

Wrapped with halwa, swathed on brides, demurely tucked into braids, quietly seductive on slender wrists- jasmine is whoever you want to be that day.

K is for kitsch

There is an elegance to kitsch that comes to light in certain gazes. And chandeliers made of flowers begin to seem whimsical rather than desperate.

L is lingering

Someone married a tree, the wedding broke but the feeling lingered. It often takes another storm to shake that kind of feeling.

M is a minimalist

For some, a single bud is a lot.

N is for the naiad

A naiad in one world is an apsara in another. What they both have is a fondness for water and bright flowers.

O is offended

This keeper of rules can’t concede that her uniform won’t allow a rose to settle in her bun.

P, plays

The children are fluid,

not pink or blue.

Not bat or bow.

No.

They’d rather play

as him today,

and her, another.

Q is a quilt

And even every forgotten car is lovingly wrapped in a quilt of fallen flowers.

R is revenge

Revenge needs sorcery and sorcery needs a few petals of a sinister disposition.

S is a surgeon

They call him a florist, but he uses a surgeon’s precision to pierce the heart of a lotus so, it may be resurrected on a divine shoulder as a garland.

T is torture

You see, he drew a moustache on his sister while she was asleep.

U is ugh, unctuous

The weight of ambitions are passed on with oily best wishes in sycophantic bouquets that are enchanted to whisper ‘one chance please’ into the right ears.

V is venom

They call it the ‘crown flower’ but its milky, alluring essence often becomes an accidental poison.

W is a wound

Pink, fleshy buds spill out of a gash in a sinewy sack.

X is a mystery

Who gave her those flowers?

Y is for yesterday

In the memory of a deep rumbling laugh from 1953, fresh garlands and sandalwood from today.

Z is zealous

A little dancer practices with zeal, timed by the flowers in her hair. Every day she must go on till the jasmine wilts.

Photographed by Priyadarshini Ravichandran

Story and words by Meera Ganapathi