Picking Daisies on Sundays
48 pages • 1-hour read
Liana CincottiPicking Daisies on Sundays
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Symbols & Motifs
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death.
Flowers
From the book title, to Dani’s nickname (Daisy), to her aunt’s business (Daisies), flowers are a central motif that represent the growth of Dani and Levi’s friendship and love, as well as the novel’s emphasis on rootedness through its depiction of family and friends. Like flowers, their relationship develops over time, through shared experiences, distance, and eventual renewal. Even when they were apart, the foundation of their connection endured, much like roots beneath the surface, drawing on flowers’ representation as a symbol of growth and rebirth.
Dani’s nickname “Daisy” ties her identity directly to this motif and highlights the intimacy of her relationship with Levi. She reflects,
It felt like our years as friends were being peeled away slowly to reveal what was left: my past romantic feelings for him, and the lack of his for me. But hearing that nickname—my nickname—one that was only used by a select group of people, felt so much more intimate coming from him (84).
The nickname is a reminder of their past and a marker of who she is to him. Levi’s use of it is both an affectionate callback to their friendship and a subtle indication of a deeper emotional connection. It represents the closeness they share, even when Dani is unsure of his feelings or her own worth.
References to flowers in the novel also indicate attraction and emotional presence. When Levi tells Dani, “The scent of flowers lingers on you everywhere you go, and I always want to follow” (175), he reveals that he’s thinking about her all the time. Levi repeatedly brings Dani daisies, a token of affection but also a private language between them. The gesture communicates what they often struggle to say directly. Each time he gives her daisies, he reinforces his desire to care for her and remain emotionally present in her life. Because daisies are tied to Dani’s nickname, they also link present moments back to their shared history, reinforcing that their connection is ongoing rather than newly formed.
Dani’s shifting relationship with flowers also highlights her personal growth. As she gains confidence in her design abilities, she begins to incorporate this symbolism into her own work. When she embroiders daisies into her final design, she literally puts herself into her work, embracing her identity and allowing her experiences and relationships to inspire her creativity, connecting to the theme of Listening to One’s Instincts as a Path to Self-Discovery. Through Dani and Levi’s relationship and Dani’s artistic development, the novel suggests that, like flowers, growth takes time; even after periods of separation, if it has deep roots, it can still bloom again.
Dani’s Letters
Dani’s letters are a motif that emphasizes her journey toward Overcoming Fear to Embrace Love and represents her true emotions—those that she’s afraid to confront directly. Written communication gives Dani a way to process emotions that are too painful to say out loud and offers a chance to express the truth without consequence. In high school, Dani first turned to writing after a conflict with Levi, using a letter to apologize when she couldn’t find the right words in person. This establishes letters as something she relies on when direct communication feels overwhelming.
After her father’s death, she continued this pattern by writing emails addressed to him. Though she has no hope of a response, these messages create a sense of ongoing connection, allowing her to narrate and share her life as though he were still present. In this way, the letters have become a part of her grief process, giving structure to emotions that otherwise feel unmanageable. She says, “My memories had been slipping away like chapters in a good book with each passing day” (57), and her letters to her father are a way of resisting losing him to memory and time. Each letter preserves details, emotions, and daily experiences, but the letters can’t stop grief from changing memory. Dani is both preserving her father and acknowledging that she’s losing access to him as she once did.
Letters take on a new significance in the novel when Dani writes to Levi to confess her feelings. This moment brings the motif full circle, as she uses the same form of communication that once helped her manage misunderstanding and loss to finally express the love that she has been unable to say aloud. The letter allows her to be honest, but it’s also risky since it forces her to commit her feelings to permanence, highlighting her new resolve to confront her fears in order to have love. Letters allow Dani to bridge gaps created by time, loss, and fear, offering a form of connection when verbal words fail and a way to express her emotions directly in her own time.
Levi’s Book
Levi’s book of poetry is given the same title as the novel, Picking Daisies on Sundays. Each chapter of the novel has an epigraph drawn from excerpts of his poems, making it a constant structural presence throughout the story. He sees the work as his magnum opus, and it represents who he’s becoming as both a teacher and an author, but it’s also a love letter to Dani that he wrote while they were apart. The book represents Levi’s interior, which the reader isn’t privy to except for the poem excerpts and one chapter entry.
Dani’s reluctance to read the book ties this motif to the theme of Overcoming Fear to Embrace Love. Her reluctance to read the book reflects her hesitation to confront what she feels for him fully and her fearful belief that the book will hold uncomfortable truths. The book contains his perspective, but it’s mediated through language that Dani can’t immediately understand, creating a barrier for her to read and understand his true feelings.
When Dani eventually learns that the poems are about her, the book becomes proof of his love rather than what she feared: The poems aren’t about Bella or an abstract creative work; they’re a personal testimony of his love that completely shatters Dani’s misguided beliefs about how he felt. When he says, “The whole book, […] every poem in there is about you. Everything I wrote came back to you” (275), Dani realizes that she was always at the center of his work. This revelation shifts her entire perspective, connecting the motif to the theme of Growing Up by Letting Go of Expectations; everything from the flowers, to his protectiveness, to his words makes sense. The book fills in the gaps that miscommunication created, giving her a clearer understanding of both him and their relationship.
Levi’s poetry is a representation of the difficulties of communicating love. Because it’s written in French and requires translation, Dani can’t read it. This becomes a metaphor for how Dani and Levi’s relationship also required time and communication to translate what caused their fracture and find a path forward for their future. Levi’s book symbolizes his identity and his love for Dani, but it also represents how understanding comes when people can see each other and a situation with clarity.
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