Xochipilli

Rosemary

Remembrance. The needle-leaf of the door and the roast.

Garlic

The house charm. Hung, braided, crushed into the first broth of a bad week.

Bay

Daphne ran. Her father the river turned her into a laurel on the bank. Apollo cut a wreath and made the tree his crown. Every soup leaf in the pot is still that tree — remembrance, excellence, a green that does not fade.

Marshmallow

Althaea. The Greek name is a mother’s name — Althea, who hid a torch to keep her child alive, then burned it in grief. The plant kept the name and became the opposite of that fire: a cool, slick root that sheathes raw tissue.

Licorice

The sweet root that makes bitter herbs drinkable — earth’s diplomat.

Lemon balm

Melissa — the bee leaf. A bright sour-sweet mint of the door-yard.

Rosehip

Chloris found a lifeless nymph and turned her into a flower. Beauty, nectar, and the west wind were given as gifts. The rose was crowned queen. The hip is the fruit that stays after the bloom — sour, mineral, the body’s memory of the flower.

Elderflower

Elder stands at the line between the garden and the wild. Flower at the first flush of heat; berry for the longer siege.

Basil

A pot by the door. The leaf that sweetens a strained table.

Lavender

The wash-herb. Scent that tells a room to lower its voice.

Sarsaparilla

Smilax. One Greek telling pairs Crocus with the nymph Smilax — he became the flower, she the vine. The vine is this sweet root.

Yarrow

Achillea — named for Achilles. The old telling says the hero’s mentor, the centaur, taught the wound-wort, and the leaf went into the field kit. The plant still answers to that name: a bitter that moves blood and closes what has been opened.

Hawthorn

The heart-berry of the hedge. May-blossom and winter fruit — a tree that keeps a door.

Echinacea

The cone-flower of the first shiver. Purple, bristled, a short ask.

Mugwort

Artemisia — the family named for Artemis, lady of wild ground and the moon’s wheel. Mugwort is the roadside sister: bitter, grey-green, a dream-leaf.

Chickweed

The cool mat that follows the sun across a winter garden.

Willow

A tree of the water’s edge. Artemis kept willow among her trees. The bark is the old ache-tea — sour, drawing, stream-bank medicine.

Sumac

Red cones on the hedge. A cold lemonade from the hill.

Dill

The seed of the pickle jar and the windowsill.

Angelica

A tall guardian of the garden. The old notes call it a master of the threshold — against a sour thought and a bad intention.

Borage

Take heart. The star-flower of courage — cucumber-cool, blue as a clear noon.

Peony

Named for Paeon, the healer who soothed a god’s wound and was hidden as a flower when jealousy came for him. Pregnant women once kept the seed. The bloom is still an offering.

Oak

Strength, morale, resistance, knowledge. A whole forest can live on one oak — fungus at the root, bird in the branch, mistletoe in the crown, acorn for everyone who walks.