License and The Mask

There is something about a masquerade that appeals to me.  It is the license granted the masked, license to do everything one would not ordinarily do if one could see the face behind the action. Second Life is one such masquerade, in fact:  avatars performing acts of fantasy, reaching out to people one could not, ordinarily.  The mask licenses behaviour.  The sultry donning of a glittered cover turns the eyes dark and turns the intentions loose.

The sensuality of a masquerade clearly must be harnessed, teased, and controlled by an experienced master of ceremonies (or mistress...)  It seems as though without the expert imagination of a games-master there can be no finely-pointed focus upon the real reason for the mask in the first place.  One does not don disguise in order to fool one's partner...

One masks in order to liberate, transform, and experience.

In both of the preceding excerpts from "The Story of O", faces are concealed.  At Roissy, O never knows the identity of each man mounting his assault upon her body during her initiation night. Each one, or none of them, may be her lover.  The blindfold is a sort of mask; it transforms inhibitions in O's case as well as Elizabeth ("9 and 1/2 Weeks") with John Gray.  The owl's mask renders O mute but all-seeing, transforming her "as though she were a real owl."

One masks in order to liberate, transform, experience, and display.  Camouflaging one bit in order to highlight another bit in sharp relief.  To conceal the face in order to display the genitals, in O's case.  To conceal the humanity of her in order to display the submission of her.

In my imagination, I revel in the idea of masquerade.  License to seize, to feel, to take, to experience, and to discard before succumbing to sweet, long sleep.