Peonies, memory, and the gardens we continue carrying with us.
I always plant peonies beside irises.
Partly because I love the contrast between them, the upright, architectural elegance of the iris beside the extravagant softness of the peony but mostly because it feels like a secret reward I have built into the garden for myself.
One beautiful bloom after another.
Just as the irises begin to fade, the peonies arrive.
The garden never empties all at once that way.
There is always another moment waiting. Another unfolding. Another extravagance preparing itself quietly beneath the leaves.
I think gardeners become deeply attached to sequences like this.
We learn to anticipate beauty in stages. The first snowdrops. The narcissus. The irises. Then the peonies, enormous and theatrical, collapsing under the weight of their own perfection after a rainstorm.
Peonies do not bloom modestly.
They arrive all at once, lush and overcommitted, as though subtlety has never once crossed their minds.
It is easy to understand why so many people claim the peony as their favorite flower.
They possess an almost unfair kind of beauty, romantic, impossibly layered.
Even people who know very little about flowers seem to pause when a peony blooms.
If I were ever to become a flower farmer, which I absolutely never will, because I deeply admire flower farmers and fully recognize how much relentless work goes into it, I think I would grow peonies.
Not only because they are beautiful, but because they return year after year.
There is something reassuring about that kind of reliability in a garden. A peony asks for patience, but once established, it rewards you for decades with constant blooms.
I have carried many of mine from house to house over the years.
Some were gifts from friends. Others came from family gardens, divided carefully in autumn and wrapped in newspaper before making their way into the backseat of my car.
Somewhere along the line, the people who love me collectively decided I am impossible to buy for unless the gift can either be planted in soil or placed on a bookshelf.
Which honestly feels pretty accurate.
So my garden has become a kind of living archive.
There are peonies in my garden connected to friendships, former homes, celebrations including my wedding and people I miss terribly.
Every time we move, I dig them up and take them with me.
The Victorians would have considered this an absolutely terrible idea.
They were fascinated by peonies, but also profoundly suspicious of them.
A healthy blooming peony bush was thought to promise prosperity, luck, and abundance. But if the flowers faded too early or the leaves dried unexpectedly, it was considered an omen of misfortune.
And disturbing the roots was worse still.
Victorian folklore warned that peonies were protected by fairies and that digging one up could invite curses or bad luck upon yourself and your home.
The punishment varied depending on the story, but none of them ended particularly well for the gardener involved.
It sounds crazy now, but I understand why people invented myths around peonies.
When they bloom, they feel almost supernatural. The flowers are too large, too lavish, too temporary. They appear for a brief moment in late spring and then vanish again, leaving only dark glossy leaves behind as proof they were ever there at all.
Across cultures, peonies have accumulated layers of symbolism and superstition.
In some traditions, bringing peonies indoors before they fully bloom is thought to invite bad luck or delay marriage.
In others, they symbolize romance, prosperity, and domestic happiness.
In Chinese culture especially, peonies are revered as the “king of flowers,” associated with wealth, honor, beauty, and a fortunate marriage.
Paintings of peonies were believed to attract blessings into the home, and planting them near the house was thought to protect against evil spirits.
The Victorians interpreted them differently, of course.
Because the densely layered petals seem to hide the center of the flower, peonies became symbols of bashfulness and modesty.
Different colors though held different meanings;
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Pink peonies represented tenderness and romantic affection.
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Red symbolized passion and devotion.
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White stood for innocence, apology, and new beginnings.
But really the thing that fascinates me most is their longevity.
Peonies can outlive people.
Not metaphorically. Literally.
A well-established peony bush can survive for generations.
There are peonies blooming in monastery gardens, abandoned farmhouses, and historic estates long after the people who planted them have disappeared entirely.
Some have survived for over a hundred years. In China, there is even a legendary thousand-year-old peony still flowering season after season.
I think about that often.
About the strange intimacy of planting something that may continue living long after you are gone.
Perhaps that is part of why I continue carrying mine from place to place despite all the old warnings about curses and bad luck. They become continuity. A thread running through different versions of my life.
Proof that beauty can survive relocation. Proof that roots disturbed are not always roots destroyed.
And every year, when the irises begin to fade and the peonies prepare themselves to bloom, I feel the same quiet anticipation.
The garden moves in sequences.
One bloom stepping forward just as another takes its bow.
The irises sharp and elegant, the peonies lush and unruly, each arriving precisely when needed.
It feels almost orchestral at times, a beautiful quiet arrangement composed entirely in petals and seasons.
Nothing blooms forever, but the garden understands timing better than we do.
It knows when to soften, when to crescendo, when to let one beauty linger just long enough before the next begins.
One beautiful thing ending.
Another just beginning.
x Rebecca
