THE WOESOME WEDDING PORTRAIT

A handsome young couple smile serenely from their gilded frame, their hands clasped tenderly, their expressions radiating the contentment of two people who have found someone who shares their peculiar appetites. Their eyes follow visitors with an interest that has not diminished in a hundred years, their smiles reveal just a little too much tooth, and neither casts a shadow beneath the arch of white roses.

Yellowed bridal lace, black silk, wilted stephanotis, dried orange blossoms, antique rosewater, cracked photographic emulsion, and a dark, animalic musk beneath the sweetness of fading flowers.