With a passion difficult to convey is the weight of all or part of him. The treasure of her lips, her teeth. The delight of her bleeds onto everyone, onto strangers.

I like the smell of my own far best. Except for the smell of new ones, like musk and cedar, I consider a kiss the finest of luck. Born adorable so we will tolerate them and most adorable of all when they are at their very worst, already it’s too late: You’re completely in love. You loved him before he was perfect but he’s perfect now, everything that is wrong with him is wrong with him ideally - except for his lifespan, a fault uncorrectable and never truly acceptable to you. But he is designed to fade away. So you can take it. And so you decide when it ends. Though he persuades you, and he leaves just as graciously as he lived and entered, generously making room for the next one so that any may be so lucky as he has been; to have a life as sweet as his own and that you might never, ever be alone.

***
 
“Researchers know that odors don't trigger memories that are any more accurate than the memories triggered by other stimuli, but odors do trigger memories that are more emotional.”

Kristen Cole, on the work of Rachel Herz The Psychology of Scent

“A dog's sense of smell is said to be a thousand times more sensitive than that of humans.”

Julio E. Correa, Extension Animal Scientist, Alabama A&M University