In an era where cross-dressing is entertainment, bisexuality’s blase’ and S/M’s infiltrated late-night TV, are there any sexual frontiers left to explore? Any taboos to break? You’ve tried whips, chains, leather, latex, rubber, strap-ons, ball gags and violet wands. You’ve fucked men, women, she-males, transvestites, transsexuals and Transylvanians. You’ve tried tantra and worked your way through the kama sutra and back again. Been there, done that, you say. But have you ever fucked the dead?

Necrophilia, by definition, is an erotic attraction to corpses--nothing more, nothing less. Unfortunately, this unusual taste has been falsely associated with snuff and even cannibalism, thanks to the likes of Jeffrey Dahmer and Ed Gein. But the true necrophiliac seldom shares these desires, even as role-play. Nor do they engage in robbing graves or breaking into mortuaries. The majority of necrophiliacs rely on fantasy and have never had erotic encounters with corpses.

Of course, every rule has an exception.

One of the most famous, or infamous exceptions to that rule is Leilah Wendell, proprietor of The Westgate Museum in New Orleans, dedicated to Azrael, the Angel of Death. Wendell’s one of the few people who actually engage in erotic encounters with the dead.

Or at least one of the few who admit it.

The author of LOVE NEVER DIES--THE JOURNAL OF A NECROPHILE, acknowledges that this underground culture has gotten a bad rap due to the media and the internet.

“Many people view necrophiles as sick, perverse, twisted individuals...If you think about it, it wasn’t too long ago where the word homosexual conjured up similar connotations.”

Instead, she calls herself a necromantic, which encompasses a spiritual aspect to the necrophilic desire.

“To me, necrophilia is not a sexual thing so much as it’s a sensual thing,” she says. “A necromantic resonates to the ‘death energy‘ and connects intensely with the Angel of Death to such a degree that their whole world and lifestyle revolves around everything associated with death, from the most spiritual, to the most sensual.”

That all sounds very mystical and magical, but one can’t help but wonder how someone could find a rotting corpse erotic--most of us cringe at a little stale sweat.

“I’ve often found the living smell much worse than the dead,” says Wendell, although she admits that her partners are beyond the foul odor of decay. “I’m into the ’moldy oldies,’ not the ’gooey louies,’ so the element of decomposition that I prefer is largely without health risks or concerns.”

Wendell can hardly be called conventional or mainstream, but necrophilia isn’t limited to black-clad goths roaming graveyards under the full moon--it’s infiltrated suburban America. That’s right--the local  necrophiliac might be drilling your teeth, teaching your kids or living right next door.

Rob (not his real name) is a forty-something professional who has been married to his high-school sweetheart for twenty-five years, and is the father of three teenagers. He’s as all-American as baseball and apple pie--four years in the military and civic volunteer work in his Midwestern community.

He also fantasizes about having sex with dead women.

“My true necro-related sexual feelings toward women didn’t manifest themselves until the late pre-teen years...Up to that point, I had many fantasies of being dead myself and having a woman make love to my corpse.”

Like Wendell, Rob says he’s never had any thoughts of murder and is not into snuff. One might even call him an old-fashioned romantic--he treats “a lady with respect, alive or dead.” He has never had sex with the dead, but has many elaborate fantasies of necrophiliac encounters.

“One position involves hanging the beautiful lady over the edge of a bed or table, on her back, letting her arms and head hang down limply toward the floor. Then I position myself in front of her and kiss her upside-down lips, stroking her dangling arms, and fondling her full, spread out breasts, then sucking her nipples. After that foreplay, I stand up and enter her mouth and come deeply in her throat.

“I do have an affinity for seeing myself oozing from every orifice.”

These fantasies could be incorporated into 'normal' sex play, so what is it about dead people that gives necrophiliacs such a boner?

“There are no mind games, no rejection, no funny looks, no long-term financial or emotional investment,” says Courtney Heinz, in the book SATYRICON USA. “It’s like taking communion.”

PSYCHOPATHIA SEXUALIS corroborates Heinz’s theory, citing a corpse’s unique ability to satisfy “an abnormal desire, in that the object of the desire is seen to be capable of absolute subjugation, without possibility of resistance.”

That implies a relationship to D/s and bondage, but don’t say that in the BDSM community--even among leather lovers, necrophilia is one of their three taboos, along with bestiality and pedophilia. By their community’s code of conduct, necrophilia violates the 'safe, sane and consensual' rule in that a dead person can’t give consent.

When your desires are taboo among the leather set, you know you’re living on the fringe of society.

Rob’s wife is aware of his tastes now, although she didn’t know his fantasies when they married--but then how many couples really know their spouses’ deepest, darkest desires? If he or she is lucky, the necrophiliac will find an understanding mate who happens to have a knack for playing dead, but what about those who want the real thing? How do they find 'willing' partners?

“I do not believe in breaking into crypts and grave-robbing,” says Wendell. “If you are meant to have such an encounter, an invitation will be extended to you--such as an open crypt door.”

Obviously, not all necrophiliacs show that kind of respect--there are always a few who give the rest a bad name. “Theoderich” doesn’t take such an aesthetic view on his website. “An experienced necrophiliac is always equipped with the bare essentials--a shovel, Vaseline and a box of rubbers. Screwing a corpse without protection is just plain stupid unless you want to be the next date for a necrophiliac.” Another website gives pointers on copping a feel at a funeral parlor, and how to avoid getting busted by “the fucking mourners.” Which leads to one of the most frequent questions necrophiliacs get--how would they feel if someone did that to their loved one?

“If my own daughter of eighteen met an untimely demise...my hope is that whatever occurred, be it nothing or everything, it was with respect,” says Rob. “What I don’t know won’t hurt me. I would be mourning her death too much to worry about what ‘might’ have happened after she died.”

To this day, the origins of this fetish remain a mystery. Both Rob and Wendell deny any kind of childhood abuse or trauma, and both started having their fantasies at a young age.

“I’ve had encounters with the Angel of Death since the age of four (she’s now 43),” says Wendell. “It seemed natural to me that as I got older, I became attracted to the dead. I can remember having necrophilic dreams since the age of ten. I was always somehow repulsed by warm flesh and being in an intimate setting made me physically nauseous.” In fact, Wendell refrains from sex with the living.

Rob’s fantasies began while he was playing with other kids in his neighborhood. “We did a lot of cowboys and Indians and I liked playing the dead Indians because they didn’t wear much clothing. I felt less clothing enhanced my ‘death’ feeling.”

This obsession with the dead goes beyond kinky sex and cheap thrills.

“It’s intimacy with Death, the entity,” says Wendell. “You cannot achieve that with another living person...There’s a whole different energy exchange. Being intimate with the dead allows your soul to soar beyond the realms of the flesh. The goal in making love in physical form is often the orgasm, whereas the goal with Death is divine rapture.”

While Rob’s fantasies may seem more sexual than Wendell’s, he certainly feels a strong element of love and spirituality in the necrophiliac act and believes everyone should have that opportunity after the death of a partner.

“Just what is so wrong in having possession of your loved one’s body for a few hours? Why do the marriage vows mean nothing after death?” he asks. “That’s the final gift of love, folks. It’s not burying her with the wedding ring or grandma’s old necklace that makes the difference--it’s leaving your love inside her forever.”

I told you he was a romantic.

A necromantic.
 

To learn more about Leilah Wendell and her books and museum dedicated to Azrael, visit the Westgate website. For the consummate website on all things necrophilic, check out Rob's Necrophilia Fantasy.

About the Authoress:

Diana Price is a photographer and a writer of horror and dark eroticism.  A former journalist and public relations whore, she is new to the world of fiction and poetry.

Diana is working on her erotic horror novel The Rape of Angels, and her work has appeared in Dark Muse and Tenebres, as well as Blood Moon zine. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her prima donna cat, Chloe. Visit her personal website, The Garden of Unearthly Delights.