Cupid Meets Taxidermy
Cupid Meets Taxidermy
Prismatic Twilight – Michai Sanders
Benya Wilfret
As I ventured into the heart of darkness—also known as online dating—I encountered Marianne, whose profession was listed as “ethical taxidermist.” This intrigued me, as I’d always believed taxidermy to be the beauty school for the undead. Imagining a date that could double as a scene from a Wes Anderson-directed horror film, I accepted her invitation.
Her studio was sandwiched between a fertility clinic and a vegan bakery, creating a triptych of life, death, and gluten intolerance. Upon entering, I was met with a tableau of animals frozen in time, each looking like they had been part of a woodland coup d’état gone awry. Marianne introduced her collection with the pride of a general parading his troops. “This is Gerald,” she gestured to a possum clutching a tiny violin. “He’s our resident musician.” I half-expected Gerald to launch into a somber rendition of “The Sound of Silence.”
Dinner was an affair to remember, primarily because it felt like dining in a mausoleum where the residents might judge your table manners. “I hope you’re fond of root vegetables,” Marianne said, serving a dish that looked as if it had been foraged from the set of The Walking Dead. She spoke of her craft with a passion that was both admirable and unnerving. “It’s not just about preserving the body,” she explained, “but capturing the soul.” I glanced nervously at a particularly surly-looking badger and wondered if its soul regretted not being a bit more photogenic in its final moments.
The conversation meandered onto the topic of her most bizarre requests. “Last month, I was asked to taxidermy a lizard in an Elizabethan ruff,” she recounted. To be or not to be, permanently stuck in contemplation, I mused. I couldn’t help but admire the dedication to keeping the arts alive, albeit in a decidedly stiff form.
Marianne’s tales of the taxidermy underworld were as fascinating as they were macabre. She told me about a client who wanted his late wife’s ashes mixed into the stuffing of her beloved dead parrot so they could “argue for eternity.” I sipped my red wine, pondering the logistics of domestic disputes in the afterlife.
As we dined under the glassy gaze of Marianne’s silent menagerie, I realized this was less a dinner date and more an audition for a role in a biopic where Norman Bates meets Dr. Dolittle. “You get used to the company,” Marianne said, mistaking my apprehensive glances for interest. “They’re great listeners.” I nodded, making a mental note to be more specific in my dating profile preferences—perhaps “must love animals, but not in a taxidermied sense.”
The night concluded with Marianne offering me a parting gift—a keychain made from the foot of a rabbit that, judging by its expression, had seen better days. “For good luck,” she said, with a smile that suggested her definition of luck might involve surviving a dystopian novel. I thanked her, wondering if the rabbit’s other feet were adorning the keys of survivors from dates past.
As I left, dodging the accusatory stare of a hawk that seemed to question my life choices, I reflected on the evening. In a world where love is often as elusive as a well-preserved specimen, my date with Marianne was a reminder that romance can be found in the most unexpected places—even between the pallid expressions and cold stares of taxidermied creatures. Indeed, Marianne, with her menagerie of the forever posed, had somehow made the leap from intriguingly bizarre to oddly captivating. It was as if Cupid had taken a detour through a natural history museum, aiming his arrow with a precision that left me spellbound in a tableau of emotional taxidermy. Her ability to find beauty in the macabre, to breathe a sort of life into that which had ceased to be, mirrored the paradox of our budding attraction—a curious blend of fascination and foreboding. And while our love story might not end with us riding off into the sunset, at least I could say my love life was officially dead and beautifully mounted.