Darkness

The Dark Lord.

He occupied a deep cavern in my mind from a very early age. I was raised Roman Catholic. The concept of the Devil played a large part in my grasp of right and wrong. Whenever i would commit a foul of some sort, as a way to rein me in, my mother used to tell me that the floor was going to open up and Satan's red, clawed hand would come through it and pull me to Hell. Seeing that this discipline method was not appropriate for discussion when we had company over, my mother developed a hand gesture that she would shyly employ to halt my straying to the netherland of misbehaving. Her hand would curl into a claw, and she would slowly raise it in the air mimicking the clutch of Satan onto my legs, making sure to keep this out of sight of anyone except me. I would immediately clam up.

The deity of my nightmares was Satan. Almost every one i can remember ended with me falling down into His fiery dominion. I couldn't even escape the rattle of this scenario while watching my afternoon cartoons. By the end of the Tom and Jerry episode "Heavenly Puss", i was cowering behind my father's lounger, afraid to even peek at the television as it transitioned to a benign commercial. I, like Tom, was fearful that neverending escalator to Heaven would suddenly turn off, sending me plummeting through the hatch in the floor, delivering me straight to the Devil.

Flash forward a few years to my early teens. I remember sitting on the floor of my parent's bedroom, with my hand on the channel dial (yes, you kids, we used to have to manually switch between channels by turning a dial on the set) ready, at the first sound of footsteps, to flip it back to the hockey game i told them that i was going to watch. I'd seen a promo for the broadcast premiere of the movie "Legend" earlier that day, and, in it they showed a glimpse of the Dark Lord, swishing across the screen. Just enough for my mind to immediately identify the spector that for most of my childhood had haunted me, but, instead of trying to avoid an encounter, i wanted to see His celluloid form. This intense desire to watch this movie resided in this newfound appetite that i had not been able to satisfy through my stomach. What i glimpsed as i covertly watched this movie (my parents would absolutely not approve me seeing a film laced with violence and "satanic" allusions) formulated the anatomy of my entire sexual identity.


Princess Lily (played by the heavenly Mia Sara).

Her eyes drew you to look at her as if they themselves would deliver you to Paradise. Her nose curled up at the tip in an elfish way that made her appear make-believe. From the moment she appeared on the screen, i was captivated. It didn't hurt that she happened to sport the look that i had assembled in my head as the ideal beauty. Dark hair. Big, bright eyes. Lips that blossomed in a plump but confined way. In fact, i think her look actually contributed to the deep impact this film had on my sexuality. Had she been blonde, i'm not sure i would've been so drawn to her outcome. As the story progressed, and she revealed a flawed character that led her to sully the virginity of the unicorn, i found myself even more attracted to her. She'd shown the compensity for bad. I didn't know it at the time, but i was allured by her potential for evil, the very same flaw that had seen me as a child regularly receive the threat of a schism in the ground opening up.

I was not prepared for the appearance of Darkness. When He finally arrived on the screen, my hand jerked, quickly switching the channels. I flipped back to see His sinister smile, and instead of recoil in fear, i eyed Him with awe. In fact, any scene without Him seemed dull. When they would flash to the fairy-esque Tom Cruise trying to arrange some way to save the Princess, i wished they'd return to the crescent-colored creature. The shine of His wicked horns that shot out of His forehead, curling into menacingly sharp tips. His yellow eyes with animalistic-slitted irises. His long, grotesque chin, jutting out and lengthening His grin. Why did i not fear this, i wondered? Why, instead, was i coveting this?

I sat riveted by the scenes where he converses with the Princess. She acts disgusted by His appearance, by His lair, by His supposition that she would become His. Despite her protests, He is unwavered in His pursuit. This too excited me. His confidence that He would have her, and have her how He wanted, rang a tone of accordance inside of me.

Eventually, a female dervish comes out, dancing and twirling around the chamber. She is wearing a long black dress, with her face completely cloaked in a skin tight black silk hood. A high collar that extends well above her crown frames this faceless feminine head. The dancing nymph picks up the Princess' hand and pulls her from her chair. The Princess reluctantly follows, trying to resist, but she is tumbling into a trance. The dancing draws the Princess deeper, evident by her movements as they begin to sway to the macabre tune all on their own. Her body accepts the urges, breathlessly responding to the desire it wells up. A montage of images alternates between the faceless demoness and the princess, both twirling around and around, until finally, a metamorphosis occurs.


The Princess has become the Dark Lord's bride.

The next image you see of the Princess is the one at right. Her lips are now darkened. Her flesh pale and uniform, showing the communion to the creatures of the deep. Her eyes are heavily lined, reducing the brightness they boasted with above ground. She slithers in her movements, moving her body in the new sensual way it has been taught. She wears the dress of the faceless demoness. She has become the demoness. Even her voice is deeper, rich with lust and lasciviousness. She comes to the Dark Lord transformed, and He welcomes her with open arms.

If anyone had come up the stairs, my ruse would've been discovered. I couldn't move. I hadn't seen the female form tarnished in such an appetizing way. I watched the Princess slip from her primrose beauty to this sinful creature happy to do her new Master's bidding. My mind had been opened to the possibility that such a dynamic could exist. Over and over, this conversion would be redrawn in my head when i needed to satisfy my erotic appetites.

I had grown up fearing the temptation that the Devil had wielded on my every behavior, only to come to find that this was misplaced. I was made to fear Darkness as a child, but when i was left to uncover the truth of my nature on my own, i realized i didn't need to be afraid of being delivered to Him.

I was exactly like Him.