the work depicts two lovers in blue robes, a man and a woman, seated together on a stone capital amid the ruins of buildings. a broken column is at their feet, covered with briar rose, perhaps an allusion to burne-jones' briar rose series. in the background is a door with a frieze of putti, and arches leading into the distance. the setting may be influenced by the ruins of polyandrion from the hypnerotomachia poliphili.