Drawn to the Dark

1972 was the year I began the shift from teeny-bopper to hard rocker. When I look back, I think of it as an almost overnight shift, but of course it wasn’t. The first time I heard an older boy sitting in the back of my school bus play “Stairway to Heaven” on an acoustic guitar when I was in 10th grade, I was a goner. I ran out as soon as I could and picked up Led Zeppelin IV. There would be no more Donny Osmond or David Cassidy for me after that until I reached the age of nostalgia.

That wasn’t what started it, though

I was in ninth grade when I saw my first copy of Circus magazine on a newsstand. What I saw stopped me in my tracks and started the process of my musical metamorphosis. A man with long dark hair and compelling eyes dusky with eyeliner stared at me from the cover. He had rings on his fingers, a sleeve of bangle bracelets on his arm, and a lovely boa constrictor slung casually over his neck. The snake reached across the man’s face under his nose and into his wavy hair, looking like it was leaning in for a hug.

That man, of course, was now-iconic “Godfather of Shock Rock,” Vincent Furnier, who eventually legally changed his name to that of his band, Alice Cooper. I would go on to do a presentation on Alice and his first solo album, Welcome to My Nightmare for my 11th grade English class. I dubbed him “the Edgar Allen Poe of Rock-n-Roll.”

By the time I was a senior in high school, I owned most of the Alice Cooper albums that existed at the time. My favorites were Killer (1971), School’s Out (1972), Billion Dollar Babies (1973), and Welcome to My Nightmare (1975). While I obviously loved Nightmare enough to do a school report on it, my favorite Cooper album was Killer.

I was particularly moved by a song about a dead baby

“Dead Babies” tells the story of Little Betty, who is left without supervision. She gets into the aspirins, eats them, and dies. On the website Old Time Music, musician and writer Corey Hoffman writes that “Cooper’s lyrics paint a vivid and disturbing picture, challenging listeners to confront uncomfortable truths about the world we live in. The song’s deeper meaning lies in its critique of societal failures, ultimately serving as a call for change and empathy.”

Deep commentary on the issues of child abuse and neglect notwithstanding, I was drawn to the song because of the sound, the mood, and to be honest, the darkness of the subject matter. I was always the new girl with few friends, and was different from most of my classmates. I sometimes retreated into my room to listen to music and write in my diary or scribble dark poetry into notebooks while pining for something I didn’t understand. In this way, I was probably not so different from many other teenagers. We always think we’re alone with the sorrows in which we wallow.

During the last semester of my senior year, I spent a lot of time with my records, writing poetry inspired by the songs I listened to on repeat. One of those poems was about Little Betty, or some infant like her. That poem, “Mommy,” can be read below.

It might be disturbing. For this reason, I ask that you don’t read it if you might be triggered by the subject matter.

Mommy

TW: infant death

Mommy

Where am I?

It’s dark in here

The morning never comes

Why don’t you help me,

Mommy? I cry

And cry for hours

I need you so bad,

Mommy, you know

I hate the night

Mommy? This box

Is very small

I love you so much

Mommy, don’t you

Love me at all?

© 1976 by Suzy Jacobson Cherry

Inspired by Alice Cooper’s “Dead Babies” from the 1971 album “Killer”