Into the Black Wood: a goofball takes back her power
confronting lost s*xiness and rebirth in the occult
I don’t know when I stopped feeling sexy. It was like I woke up one morning and the fire of my gaze was obscured by a dense fog. I’d waft it away, flailing like mad, and the fog would grow thicker—a taunt. A reminder that once was, no longer is. Now I carry a compact mirror and fuss with my jeans; I slip my thumbs through the belt loops and yank the high waist up over my eyes.
This is the only way to forget the pain of lost confidence: to disappear. To become jeans! Now let me tell you a story.
The other night I went on a double date to a brilliant dance performance at the Latvian Society of Philadelphia, of all places. I take excessive pride in the fact that I set the other couple up at my birthday dinner in July, and they’ve been smitten since. Anyway, we’re all drinking Ukrainian imports at the bar which clearly hasn’t changed since 1975 (just my type). It’s dark, illuminated by red lights and fake candles to set the scene for the show. A crowd of women with cropped, asymmetrical haircuts and middle-aged men pile in, and I realize this is where aging theater gays congregate. We’re in amazing company.
The show is called Black Wood. If you’re lucky enough to have tickets to any of the upcoming sold out performances, don’t read any further, because I’m going to spoil it. Black Wood is an erotic occult masterpiece from top to bottom (heh). You enter through a winding hallway transformed into a damp, dark thicket, the brush adorned with animal skulls and voodoo dolls. Take your seat and behold the astonishing set: it’s A24’s The Witch meets True Detective season 1 meets Missy Elliot’s “Get Ur Freak On” music video. A haunted forest where a threatening black house and a witchy apothecary are situated among the trees. The producer, bonafide queer icon Gunnar Montana, does everything himself. It is seamless. Too good for Philadelphia.
My friend Mike knows one of the dancers, so our seats are right along the floor. This is to say we’re close enough to feel their breath, which only makes the experience that much more intoxicating. The dancers crawl out from every corner of the room to what sounds like Billie Eilish’s ghost, scantily clad in tribal, post-apocalyptic costume. They are the coven of the black wood. And for the next 50ish minutes, we follow a tale of domestic violence, gore, human sacrifice, satanic worship, sisterhood, and the most jaw-dropping convergence of art and athleticism that I have ever witnessed.
As Black Wood progresses, the violence is eclipsed by a dark, complex sensuality. The red woman depicts the devil. She does a strip tease in the center of a rope pentagram, her entire head covered in red mesh—burlesque asphyxiation—teetering on glitter heels. Eventually the witches are all topless in thongs. Tattooed, nipple-pierced, abs of steel, topless. And it registers, but it doesn’t, because your brain is so fixated on the creative mastery, their bodies more instrument than human. Andrew and I’s hands grip tightly. A new bond is forming—the kind we sometimes forget is possible at a certain point in a relationship, and thus, feels electric.
When the show ends, we’re all speechless… and yet we can’t shut up. We’re trying to make sense of what we just saw, how it fits into the context of our own mundane existence. Andrew had read the dancers’ bios earlier that day. He hadn’t known one could obtain a master’s degree in dance. It made sense to him now; this was the thesis. I thought I was alone in holding back tears but it turns out, we were all on the verge of overflow.
Mike’s friend joins us on the floor. She’s in a gray robe and slippers, rubbing her feet, working out the night’s pain. With her choppy black bob, pale blue eyes, and dimpled smile, she is mesmerizing. I’ve never seen anyone with less body fat. I tell her that, verbatim, like a rabid fangirl. And it occurs to me that we are here, sharing this platonic, reverential moment of artist and audience and friends-of-a-friend with someone my fiancé just saw naked, gyrating on other naked women. To chat with her is as hypnotic as watching her perform; her whole vibe is like water. I don’t feel jealousy. Rather, I become possessed with curiosity: about her, about dance, about darkness, about my relationship, about what it means to squeeze your partner’s hand when The Boobs appear. And you don’t need me to tell you that one inescapable day, The Boobs will appear. Like so many of life’s surprises, it’s all what you make of it.
In Lisa Carver’s essay for The Paris Review, “Two Strip Clubs, Paris and New Hampshire,” she chronicles her experiences at the Moulin Rouge in Paris, and a dive-bar strip club in Bedford, New Hampshire—both with her classically French husband. She writes:
Bruno had never been to a strip club before. Bruno is a seducer. Sex for him is communication, emotion, a tango. Me, not so much. I’m an erratic dancer, pretty erratic emotionally too now that I think about it, and way too goofy for sexy talk. I just dive into sex like I do everything else, with my enthusiasm making up (I hope) for any lack of skill.
When we got in the uber after Black Wood, I thought of that passage: how I used to fancy myself a Bruno, but now identified with Lisa Carver, kind of clumsy about getting laid. More silly goose than temptress. I felt the afterglow of consuming live erotica with my partner for the first time dimming. And I felt grimy, narcissistic even, to take this thing of beauty personally. I was backsliding. We weren’t holding hands anymore.
I retreated to the couch when we got home, legs propped up on the coffee table, stiff, staring blankly at the wall. Andrew always knows when something’s up. Not because he’s so intuitive; I’m just a dead giveaway. When he asked what was wrong, I explained that this was a big deal for me given my history of anxiety, to experience that together and not just be ok, but enjoy it—that I was sad he didn’t point it out himself. I wanted him to be proud of me. And on came the shame, again, now for seeking praise for bare minimum personal evolution. You saw a human breast in an artistic context without crying and ruining the night? Great fucking job, Dia!
“You know your boobs are nicer than any of theirs,” he remarked, perfunctorily, and I realized this wasn’t about boobs and I wanted to kill him with my bare hands.
Not feeling sexy had been gnawing at me for a while, a fibromyalgia kind of pain that no one sees or believes, especially when you post a lot of selfies, which I do. It doesn’t help that “sexy” is one of those words like “love” that will actively waste your time trying to define it. So I never had the words to identify what was lacking; it’s hard to revive something nameless.
Black Wood challenged me to find the driest, most infertile land of my psyche and grow something. Black Wood gave me language. And then, without thinking, it just poured out of me, this call of the wild. An unflinching confession of primordial feminine violence. I lost my sexual power because I’d been spending too much time in the light. Without that balance of darkness, of reveling in the underbelly, pleasure becomes one-dimensional. I’d been flattened by my own panicked resistance, the fear of my own shadow. And just as often as I’d shy away from getting on top in bed, I’d preface my opinions with “this probably sounds stupid, but…” It’s all connected. Sexiness is connection. Mine was severed. I’m soldering the links back together.
Toward the end of Black Wood, the dancers formed a circle. Silence fell as they lit candles and burned sage and the fog returned—dense, impenetrable. A goddess emerged in the center where she attached to a metal hook by her hair and presented a full aerial spectacle, twirling so fast, you feared she might launch through the ceiling. Intuition: strength misconstrued as spiraling. I know that to return to myself will require a kind of hurricane force that leaves behind some wreckage. As Stevie Nicks once sang, in the web that is my own, I begin again.
When the lights cut on, every luminous bare breast lined up on stage, the girls swaying, laughing. One slapped another’s ass. They took a bow. Standing ovation. The old earth witch hymnal cracked through the air:
Just like the white winged dove…
“More silly goose than temptress.”
Good line!
I don't know what the literary equivalent of The Boobs would be (or if there even is one), but I'd be willing to bet that reading your beautifully-written evocative prose probably comes close to striking the same chord for for many people (in a very good way, to be clear).
You pour your heart and soul into this conveyance of emotion, you learn to show parts of yourself to strangers that are typically reserved for decades-long relationships (or therapy sessions), and you do it with the mastery and confidence that rivals every single one of those dancers from the show. You creatively communicate the important, difficult, sometimes sexy, and sometimes tragic experiences that shape you, and (I assume) you do it fully knowing that not everyone is going to "get it", but for those that do, it is undoubtedly life-changing. How those lives change are unique to every person, but you're the one effecting that change, and I hope you always know that.
Your vibe might be more like Topo Chico than regular water, but you ARE Black Wood! I'm so glad you were able to experience it, and I hope you're already marking your 2024 calendar for next year's performance (several dates, obvi)