Marigold Tea

Mushroom circles. Soft, ivory, silky tops arranged in a round that was a little too perfect to be coincidental. We passed through this point in the forest together many times, pointing to these circles and wondering what Fae might cross into our world through here.

That’s their little gate into our world, you would explain, as we stood in the woods, feeling the gentle emerald grass under our toes, they bring their gifts of spring, the blooming flowers, their songs among the trees, and then they vanish.

I bet that’s just some story your mother made-up, I would answer with a careless laugh.

But you would always smile, as if you knew something I didn’t. Then you would kiss my cheek, and my soul bubbled like the nearby brook. You always knew how to stir the wonder in my chest, my love for these deep and ponderous woods and your stories of the Fae.

You also brought a lot of gifts before you vanished.

Today I came back to the mushroom circle. In this ancient forest, it had stood through raging monsoons and through the arid drawls, through boiling heat and fierce chills. Some mushrooms appeared, some vanished, but the same shape remained. My heart settled with the damp dew on the grass, and silent became a thick veil over my shoulders. I turned my eyes down toward the grass.

You had also taught me to make marigold tea. Marigolds grew around this area, yellow bulbs that poked their cheerful heads out of the grass to see if I was well. I was not well today, but I was glad to see their warm faces. They offered their gifts of petals, and I would take them.

Pick, pick, pick, pick. A few soft plucks, and I dropped them in my basket. In the meantime, I watched the mushroom circle. My eyes darted around to see if glittering magic marked the air. Maybe I would hear something. The fluttering of wings, or you miraculously drawing a breath in the air. Maybe I would turn, and you would lean close to lock your lips with mine.

Your breath smelled of marigold tea.

Marigold tea had a simple recipe. Crush the bright petals into a powder. I used the wooden mortar and pestle which had been your wedding gift to me. Even now, I could feel your warm fingers squeezing the smooth wood, as if your ghost’s fingers had interlaced themselves into mine. Pour and mix the powder into the boiling water, watch it become a soft, golden elixir. Sometimes I would add cinnamon, a little heat, especially during the cold months. The spice on my tongue made me feel better when the tears fell down my cheeks.

Warm, bittersweet, and it always needed sugar. It tasted like the pure forest, the fantasies of Fae, your last kiss. I looked out my window toward the woods, as I held my mug in my shaking hands.

I knew now that you had seen the Fae before you died, the last first spring of your life.

We had walked into the forest to gather marigolds, and I could not tell what you had seen. But your eyes had sparkled with the remembrance of this sacred ground, and perhaps with some foreign laughter I did not understand.

My love, do you hear something? I whispered.

He did not answer, but the smile lingered. The rest of his body was withering, his embrace felt like sand passing through my arms. Yet his smile was eternal, as steady and sure as the tall pines which were our constant companions.

But I understood that you would die happy. And I live with what remains of your breath, the soft scent of marigolds.

The next morning, I came to the woods before dawn. Kneeling low, my fingers pressed the mud beneath me. Still cold and drunk, as the sun had not yet found this part of the woods to revive them. Your bones were a part of this ground somewhere. I kissed the soil, lingering for a moment in my motion of veneration. I could feel your face in my hands, a smile wrinkling from somewhere, hands that placed the marigolds in mine.

All the while, a sweet, crystalline laugh that I did not recognize glittered in my ears.