Orange blossom

The underskirt is plaited in front and trimmed with rich lace, caught up by sprays of orangeblossom. The train is long and plain. The high bodice has folds of silk from the right shoulder to the waist, and the front is filled in with lace, fastened by a spray of orangeblossom on the collar at the left side. Three-quarter sleeves with lace cuffs, ornamented by a spray of orangeblossom. Orangeblossom in the hair, with a long tulle veil.

Ethel[’]s raiments were of bridal white, the sprig of orangeblossom was gracefully fastened by a tender hand.

Got up as a young bride, man, veil orangeblossoms, drove out the road to Malahide.

In Seville / he lifted the whole weight of orangeblossom scent / and went off with it and spangled dolphins spouting crystal / and some cascade music frozen into tiles.

I am literally a child of Esquire, or hidden sin of Mr. Esky’s, since my first drinks wers^([sic]) stolen bottles of Tanqueray, Beefeater, Cutty Sark, Lemon Hart Jamaica, molassesdark Myers, Benedictine, Drambuie, Cointreau, Triple Sec, Hennessy, Courvoisier, Grand Marnier, that orangeblossom Scotch liqueur, […] Death isn’t easy to give up. We all know how he felt sipping away at it, verse after verse. And we know it more strongly some days than others, when the romance floods back with a knockout whiff of orangeblossom scotch, […]

You and I, sister, sink / in its round warmth, as in proper work, / of survival we make peace: / there are no markets replete / with oranges and their incense of orangeblossom, / nor purplish song of the tomato, / nor rich green offering / of lettuce in the air / with their loosened drop of rain, / where the smell of mitraille / and dry blood / have emptied the sky.

[I]t ends with you on your knees in a cavern of porphyry at dusk by the sea odor of orangeblossom and fishspawn reading pageproofs. […] Odor of orangeblossom and of caverns beneath the sea.

The window’s shutters hadn’t yet been closed against the day’s heat, and the faint, wavering calls of a waterseller from the causeway below drifted in along with scents of orangeblossom and baking spicebread.