More on: sexuality

Everywhere on my stroll among these rolling hills this morning, I see nude young men. I’d say they are naked as well. Many are undressed. Quite a few have no clothes on.

The Possibilities of Sainthood by Donna Freitas (Farrar Strauss Giroux, 2008) Dark Sons by Nikki Grimes (Hyperion, 2005) Trouble by Gary Schmidt (Clarion Books, 2008) Once Was Lost by Sara Zarr (Little, Brown, 2009) AS A TEENAGER, I was given several novels in a series of inspirational young-adult (YA) books. On their pastel covers, modestly sweatshirted girls with big hair and…

SHE HAD A CHOICE: she could have flown to Boston to make a proper farewell. Gene was sure of it. “He’s in a very loving state these days, Melanie. Very weak, very thin, very loving. You’d hardly recognize him. I know it would mean a lot if you came.” But she couldn’t. They were fifteen…

Our opened mouths close, but the soft boundary of our bodies remains porous for a while longer. An exchange keeps going on between the darker afternoon light inside and the brighter light outside. The day is loosening its hold. Birds flash across the windows, unidentified. We are still not back from wherever it is we…