Daphne Boy

Isfahan

The Fifteenth Tale of the Daphne Boy

by George Gauthier

Author's Note: This is a tale of an eternally youthful boy named Alexander, here called Iskander, and those he encounters in the Near East during the late XIth century AD.

This is the fifteenth in a series of tales about an undying youth named Alexander or Alex in this story. The other stories in this series so far are 'Antebellum', set in the American South just before the Civil War, 'Daphne Boy', set in Roman Syria, 'El Dorado', about the conquistadors, 'The Erythraean Sea', set in Arabia just before the rise of Islam, 'Stupor Mundi', about the Sixth Crusade, 'Ferghana', a tale of the Silk Road in Central Asia, 'Zulu' set mostly in Southern Africa during the Anglo-Zulu War, 'Sol Invictus' set in the Roman Empire during the reign of the dissolute androgynous and sexually insatiable gay emperor Elagabalus 'Reniassance' set in Italy around 1500, 'Gupta' set during the Golden Age in India in the century AD, 'Palmyra' set during the crisis of the IIIrd century that nearly destroyed the Roman Empire, 'Tobago', set in the Caribbean and South America during the middle of the XVIIth century, 'The Apostate' set during the age of the Romand Emperor Julian the Apostate in the mid IVth century, and 'Marlowe' set in Elizabethan London.

It contains graphic descriptions of the male human body, of consensual and non-consenual sexual activity between adult males, and considerable non-sexual violence including combat. If any of this would offend a reader, read no further. This is not intended for persons younger than an age where they may freely and legally select their reading matter in whatever jurisdiction applies. It is offered for entertainment. If it manages to both intrigue and to provoke prurient interest, it will have succeeded in its aim.

It is as historically accurate in its setting as I could make it, with only minor poetic license for the sake of the story. This tale, after all, is fiction. It is not a historical monograph. Only the the rulers mentioned are real people. The rest of the characters are not intended to resemble any actual person living or dead.

Readers who like these stories might want to try my 'Jungle Boy' series of tales in a modern setting, posted in the Gay/Authoritarian section of the archive. See also my series 'Naked Prey' in the historical section, my 'Mer Boy' series in Gay/Beginnings, and the 'Track and Field' series in Gay/College. For links to my stories, look on the list of Prolific Authors on the Archive.

Comments and feedback welcome at georgegauthierdc@gmail.com.

Chapter 1. Isfahan 1073

"Over here, wine boy. Some more of the Shiraz red, if you please."

I bowed my head and walked across the tavern to fill the cup held out by the customer, a tall lean dark-haired man in flowing robes and turban. He had a nasty looking scar on his left cheek, presumably from a sword. He leered at me as I approached his table dressed only in filmy houri boy pants, hung so low on my hips you could look down my cleavage, much like the sagger boys of today. For obvious reasons, wine boys did not observe traditional Muslim standards of modesty in dress. Actually more than once, right there in the common room, a customer had yanked my pants down to my ankles to get a preview of my charms.

"Iskander, isn't it?" he asked, unsure of my name but sure of his attraction to me.

"What a pretty little thing you are. Tell me boy, you are what, fifteen?"

I nodded though the truth was that I was closer to fifteen centuries than that many years. I was born in the late second century BC in southern Germany. For reasons I have never understood, I had stopped growing and aging some months after reaching my seventeenth birthday. Even after more than thirteen hundred years, I had the body and the smooth beardless visage of a stripling, a youth in his teens. With my fawn-like build, hairless body, and delicate, almost elfin features, I could easily pass for fifteen. That was what the customer preferred and what my master had bid me to tell customers who asked my age.

I cannot explain my eternal youthfulness. It just happened. I can only guess there was something genetic at work, a benign mutation, I suppose. Certainly there had been no encounter with a sorcerer nor a pact signed in blood with eldritch powers.

The customer's hand caressed my chest, fingering the gold rings that pierced my nipples, identical to those through my earlobes. I could feel the calluses on his hand from years of practice with a sword. His rough hand roam down my scalloped belly and even reached through the nearly sheer fabric to cup my genitals. Then he shifted his hand to my ass, slipping it under the waistband of my pants to caress and squeeze my butt cheeks. Finished with his tactile assessment, he gave a nod to my master Barash confirming my original impression. No doubt my owner would soon send me upstairs to entertain the customer with my sweet body.

I was working as a wine boy cum whore in Isfahan, capital of the Great Seljuk Empire, a rapidly rising Muslim state that had crushed the Christian Byzantine Army nearly two years before at Manzikert, which ultimately resulted in my capture at the city of Tarsus where I had settled into a pleasant and prosperous existence as a merchant. It was my second sojourn in that city over the centuries.

I had thought myself safe in Tarsus, far from the frontier. Since the days of Basil the Bulgar Slayer a half century earlier, it had seemed that Rome, as the Byzantines styled their Greek speaking empire, had finally achieved a certain strategic position well nigh unto unshakable against the Muslims, i.e. the Arabs. Their reinvigorated state encompassed the entire Balkan Peninsula and Anatolia east to Persia with outlying territories in Italy and the Crimea.

I had not fully realized the rot that had set in the Byzantine state during the last fifty years: the neglect of the old militia army and the reliance on mercenaries, the abuses of power of the landed magnates that allowed them to withdraw their lands from the tax rolls, the self-dealing of the civilian officialdom. Also, I had not counted on the irruption of the Turks from Central Asia. Nor could I have known that the Byzantine Emperor would fall for the hoary tactic of a feigned retreat at Manzikert and send his heavy cavalry pell mell after light cavalry without the support of light infantry, contrary to all Byzantine military doctrine. He lost the flower of his army in the catastrophe including the cadre that could have trained new soldiers to replace those lost in that battle.

When the Seljuk Turks captured the city of Tarsus, I was enslaved for my deadly effectiveness with my blades while serving in the city militia. My blond hair streaming under my round metal coif had become a familiar and dread sight to the hordes assaulting our walls. With my centuries of training, practice, and experience allied to my speed and agility, I was deadly with bow and sword. But ultimately the odds were too great. The city eventually surrendered on terms which included turning "that little blond devil from the walls" over to the the Seljuk commander as his personal trophy.

I expected to be slain outright, but the Turkish commander decided he would rather keep me as a captive and bed mate than turn me into a cold corpse. He was the first of many victorious Seljuks to taste my charms. After a long night of carnal delight, he announced to his army that I was to be shared with his soldiers and passed around for their delectation. Each other night, anywhere from a dozen to a score of soldiers chosen by lot from the different units would have their way with me. The rule was that they could neither harm nor disfigure me. I was, after all the personal property of their commanding general, and also destined to pleasure their comrades on subsequent evenings. So they were put on their best behavior to pass the captive pleasure boy on to their comrades intact and looking pretty.

I cannot say that the soldiers really mistreated me, not by their lights anyway not by the customs of the time. I was, after all, a prisoner of war, a former enemy taken captive, stripped naked, and enslaved as a pleasure boy. Oh some of the soldiers could get a bit rough, slapping me around, spanking or strapping me, but most were decent enough. For my part, I knew my place and acted accordingly: uncomplaining and complaisant, physically and sexually submissive, enthusiastic and athletic in our couplings.

During the day I acted as my general's body servant, attending to his raiment and meals, helping with setting up and taking down his pavilion, loading the carts, that sort of thing. As much as the weather permitted he kept me totally naked. I became a well known figure in the camp, both from my attendance on the general and my assignations with his soldiers on alternate nights.

Six months later, my general died of dysentery and I was sold into slavery in the newly designated capital of Isfahan. My new master, a former soldier named Barash operated the finest wine shop in the capital with a top tier clientele and bid a high price for me. But then, he knew that, with my exotic beauty, I would command fees he could count in silver rather than in copper coin.

My personal situation aside, there were worse places to live than the Seljuk capital. Isfahan is a pleasant green city which lies in the lush plain at the foot of the Zagros mountains. It flourishes in a desert thanks to the Zayandeh River whose name means 'life giver" in Old Persian. The river arises in the Zagros mountains and flows for four hundred kilometers (250 miles) before ending in the Gavkhouni swamp east of the city.

For a city in a desert the climate is temperate with regular seasons. Though the summers can be very hot, the open plain to the north allows cooling winds to flow through the city. Before modern air conditioning, the more prosperous inhabitants cooled their dwellings with windcatchers which directed the flow of air through underground irrigation channels called qanats where they gave up their heat to the cool underground water. Natural air pressure then force the flow back up into the dwellings. No machinery was required. For the rest of the populace, temperatures at night are moderate which is why so many of the poorer sort of people slept on their roofs. In winter the climate is mild but the nights can be cold. Snow is not unknown.

Under its new sultan Malik Shah I, son of Alp Arslan, the victor at Manzikert, the city became the capital of the Seljuks, a Turco-Persian dynasty that ruled a newly conquered empire sprawling from central Anatolia and Syria through Mesopotamia, Iran, and beyond -- all the way to Trans-Oxiana and the Aral Sea in Central Asia. It also controlled the southeastern corner of the Arabian peninsula, a region controlled in modern times by the Emirates and Oman. Originating in the Turcoman tribal confederations of Central Asia, the Seljuks quickly adopted Persian culture and became great patrons of Persian art, language, and literature. The Seljuks were to be the target of the First Crusade in 1096.

This was the setting of my latest experience of sex slavery. There was something of a pattern in my centuries of living, where periods of wealth and freedom came interspersed with periods of captivity and slavery, even sexual slavery. The truth is that all my long life I have been both blessed and cursed by a lovely form and face that inspire admiration and lust in the heart of any male who appreciates a beautiful boy. I am small and pretty and uniformly bronzed from habitual nudity. So I looked entirely too much like someone's catamite or pleasure boy. With my androgynous if wiry physique and fine-boned features I fell far short of normal male standards in height, muscular development, and secondary sexual characteristics like beard and body hair. I was smooth even at the fork of my legs. Since I had stopped aging before my beard grew in I have never had to shave. The upshot of it all was I often wasn't taken seriously as a male but was considered fair game for capture and taming.

I have had much experience of rape and sexual servitude over the centuries. Enslaved at fourteen by a Roman tribune as a spoil of war, I became my captor's catamite and body slave until sold on to a merchant in Massalia, modern Marseille. My new master also kept me nude and used me as a messenger and pleasure boy but later put me to work as a scribe as well. Set free by his will when he died suddenly of a fall from a horse, I traveled to the East and made my first fortune in Alexandria, working in a boy brothel while investing in mercantile ventures on the side. That is where I took up the Roman habit of having all my body hair, little as it was, plucked with tweezers. After several decades of plucking it stopped sprouting. So I was completely hairless and would stay that way forever.

In the early first century AD I spent a few years in ancient Antioch as a Daphne Boy, enslaved for an unjust debt as a temple prostitute. The cult of the nymph Daphne is allied to that of Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Male acolytes, for that is what they called us, offered themselves to boy lovers. We were very popular because we were scrupulous about personal hygiene, trim and fit, and hand picked for our beauty of face and form. Although we could not chose our clients, the life was pleasant enough, with bright airy accommodations, good food, and decent treatment. The priests let us keep tips from our clients so we had a bit of coin to spend on our two days off per month.

I made friends among the other boys and even some of my clients, though I was glad enough when circumstances freed me before my unchanging youth could be noticed. In some ways I still have fond memories of my time as a Daphne Boy, slave though I then was. Other periods of slavery before and since were not so pleasant. I had spent a year in the Colosseum as a gladiator, forced to fight for my life before the crowd. I became quite the crowd favorite, fighting naked and armed with two knives. They called me the Killer Catamite because, after my bouts, I was regularly given to rich spectators who paid gold for the chance to fuck me fresh from my latest combat, still covered with sweat, the dust of the arena, and the blood of my foe.

Now once again I had been cast into slavery. It could have been much worse. I could have been sent to the galleys or the mines where life expectancy is only three years at best. I was not kept in a cage or shackled. Barash was a decent master, firm but fair, reasonable in his demands on me, and proprietarily protective of his boys. Customers understood that the man would not tolerate abuse or rough stuff and he had the size and strength to enforce his will. He also had a gruff sense of humor combined with a tavern keeper's professionally cynical outlook on the human condition. A patient man and a good listener, he seemed to be able to carry on three conversations at the same time with customers and staff. I liked the way he could talk drunks down from a fight, though if it came to it, he and his bouncer could likely handle any three men. He kept a bung tapper under the counter for just that purpose.

"Go with him, Iskander. Be sure to please him, there's a good lad." my owner said, not unkindly, slipping the two silvers the man had paid him into the sash of his tunic. Anything I got in tips I had to share with him fifty-fifty.

I took the man upstairs. Once there he opened the screens of the windows the better to see me. Delight marked his face as he slipped the houri boy pants off my hips and let them fall to my ankles. I stepped out of them naked. The customer was practically drooling. And why not. I dare say that I was a vision of youthful male pulchritude.

What he stared at was a comely youth (a "cute twink" in modern parlance), apparently of no more than sixteen summers and prettier than any boy rightly ought to be. I was quite slender and short for my age, my fawn-like physique graced with a wiry musculature, toned and taut from hard work. You might say I was almost skinny, with narrow shoulders and a flat but corrugated chest and stomach sporting well-defined abdominals, prominent ribs and sharp hip bones, with a firm round rump. Only the marked definition of my muscular development hinted that I was past my growth spurt.

The tracery of veins on my forearms, calves, and belly showed how very little body fat I carried. I like to think my manhood is more than adequate but I wouldn't be scaring the horses. It takes both my small hands to cover an erection, but only one when it was soft. My naturally pale skin wore the tawny gold that results from long exposure to the sun. So my wiry physique was sleek and smooth and deeply tanned.

My features were delicate with an almost elfin quality to them: a flawless bronzed complexion, a straight nose, finely arched brows, a chiseled jaw line, high cheekbones, and large green eyes blessed with eyelashes so long they could never have been meant for a boy, topped by a tousled blond thatch which almost reached my shoulders.

I had the looks that tavern owners and their customers preferred in their wine boys. The kinds of looks that inspired poets to homoerotic allusions in their verses. In traditional Persian culture, homosexuality and homoerotic expressions were openly tolerated. You might encounter it in public places from taverns to military camps to bathhouses and coffee houses. Even in the monasteries and seminaries. Sufi practitioners reportedly achieved states of spiritual ecstasy by admiring beautiful boys as if they were earthly glimpses of the beauty of god. Later on, during the Safavid era, boy brothels were legally recognized and taxed.

Having stripped me, the man disrobed revealing the lard lean body of a warrior, his olive skin marked with several more scars.

"Now you are mine, pretty one, at least for this time that I have rented you for. I only wish I could buy you and take you with me. A delicate flower like you would grace my tent with your extraordinary beauty. I have never seen a finer boy. You have the face and body that poets will sing about, but for now your task is to worship my manhood."

He shoved me to my knees and presented his cock for worship, thrusting down my throat so far I found it hard to breathe. He was the domineering sort who takes total command of a boy and uses him hard. In all honesty, I have to admit that I respond to that approach. I am by nature a sexual submissive, a bottom boy at heart. That is why I am strongly attracted to such men.

I knew I would be sore from this assignation, but I had to do my best to please him. I had too much self-discipline to resist any use to which a customer put my body. They had rented it for the hour I was with them and that was that.

Even after the man shot his cum into my mouth he remained hard. Some men are like that. It meant he would recover quickly and be capable of another ejaculation in a very short time. The man stood me up facing him and had me spread my legs. Holding me under my arms, he lifted me bodily, setting me down, impaling me on his cock. It was a sudden total penetration, coming before I was ready for it. I gasped.

"There there boy. Lock your heels behind me and take some of your weight on your legs. I am not trying to rip you open with my fleshy sword. If you hurt down there it is because you are so small and tight. I enjoy vigorous sex with a boy, for the pleasure it gives me, but I feel no joy in inflicting pain, even on unworthy boys such as yourself."

I nodded and locked my heels behind his back. I still squirmed and gasped but his long arms closed around me holding me in place. He spoke in some Turkic dialect I could not readily follow though I knew he was expressing his disdain for my kind, boys who give themselves to men, as if I were a wine boy by choice. I don't know how many times I have been called a boy slut or a pussy boy by men who were fucking me for coin. If they despised boys why didn't they leave me alone. Let then find whores.

Not that my wishes mattered in that situation. He shoved my back to the wall and started pumping into me. My body responded as it always does. Soon I was erect and moaning. He smiled at me though scornfully, pulling my turgid cock out and letting it slap back against my belly. He kissed me, thrusting his tongue into my mouth forcefully. He left no doubt that this was nothing less than a conquest as he continued his scornful comments on, presumably, my ancestry and my numerous physical and moral failings.

Finally he stiffened and grunted, shooting another huge load into my ass. That did take the wind out of his sails for a little while, though it was not long before he had me braced against the wall, my head resting on my crossed arms as he plowed into me over and over. Only afterwards did we actually lie on the bed. Or rather he did. As soon as he was up to it, literally, I had to sit astride his hips and impale myself on his manhood. His virility was tremendous. He fucked me three times in little more than an hour and left me sore and bruised and battered. I could hardly drag myself downstairs still fully naked to report to my master.

He was annoyed that the man had taken my houri boy pants with him as a souvenir and insisted I finish my shift in the nude. That let the customers see the finger marks that hard man had left on my ass and garnered me all sorts of phony sympathy as these men speculated on just how the marks had been inflicted on the little wine boy, poor thing. They speculated out loud on what lascivious acts might I have been performing in the acquiring of my "battle scars." The bolder of them caressed or squeezed my bare ass cheeks. One man turned me over his knee and started spanking my ass till my master intervened, grabbing and twisting the man's arm to make him let me go.

"I'll have no rough stuff with the boys. If you want to play with this one, it will cost you two silvers to take him upstairs."

The man shook his head declining the offer. I got back on my feet and went back to serving wine.

As a small nude slave boy I was fair game for their pats and their roving hands. I could neither complain nor resist. Both as a slave and as a Christian, it was against the law for me to strike a Muslim no matter what the provocation. In any event, sexual overtures and touching could never be considered a provocation for my sort, a wine boy whose body was for rent. I went about my business trying to look perky and cheerful. Sullen slave boys get switched for their presumption. Barash was a decent man, but he had a business to run too. So I put a smile on my face and let everyone ogle my booty.

It must have been good for business since I was very much in demand that evening. So much so that my hole was sore the next day. My master even smiled as we closed up for the night and patted me on the head. The next day, he outfitted me with a new pair of houri boy pants though these rode even lower on my hips and ass and the legs barely reach the knees, the better to display my body. I sighed as I pulled them on. If I had to be a brothel boy anyway, I might as well look the part.

Chapter 2. The Poet

I slept atop the roof that night, as I did during the hot summer nights. My master never bothered me then, recognizing that I needed a good night's sleep every night if I were to look my best for the customers. They wanted their wine boys fresh and perky. Toward that end all of us wine boys were treated to a regime of an decent diet, regular baths, depilation (not needed in my case), unguents, and cosmetics. That left us healthy, smooth, sweet smelling, and prettily made up.

I was never locked up. Like most slaves I went about entirely free of physical restraints. The difficulties of escape and the threat of punishment were enough to keep all but the boldest or most recalcitrant in line. I myself was biding my time, waiting for the right moment. It would do no good to try to run away without a plan, funds, clothing, weapons, and transport. Arranging an escape would be a formidable challenge on my own. If only I could enlist someone in my cause, but whom?

Yes I had won free from slavery in the past but almost half the time not from actual escape and evasion. A fall from a horse killed my second master who had freed me in his will, years earlier than he ever expected to die. In Antioch the Roman governor had set me free from slavery as a Daphne boy after my heroics in rescuing the two young sons of the garrison commander from certain death in a fire. My freedom from slavery as a pearl diver had been through purchase and later emancipation by the merchant Peroz, he of fond memory, one of the most thoroughly decent men I have ever known. A coup d'etat in Ancient Rome led to my freedom from gladiatorial combat in the arena.

All prior escape attempts had been a success, except one. Despite my initial escape from that pearl diving camp, I got caught some days later after my horse died in the desert. I was punished then but not severely since I had spared the guards' lives during my escape, just tying them up instead of killing them. That taught me never to make a bloody exit. It was better not to commit crimes in escaping that would give the authorities extra incentive to hunt me down or to post a reward or punish me harshly if recaptured: no murders or thefts, except maybe that of a horse.

A regular customer in those days was Rufi al Hejazi, a Sufi poet. Not quite twenty-three, he was willowy and slender, his small-boned frame standing maybe a couple of inches taller (5 cm) than I was though he weighed little more. The young man very well favored with chiseled if slightly effeminate features and large grey eyes peering out from under fine arching eyebrows. Aside from a narrow mustache he was clean shaven. Though he wore the traditional long robe of the region, his was cut a bit tight in the upper torso, showing he had a slim trim body. I found myself wishing I could see more of it.

Rufi always watched me as I went about my duties in the tavern though he had never rented me out, much to my disappointment. Friendly as he was, there was a line he would not cross. The owner did not mind if I spent time chatting him up a bit, not with a regular customer, as long as I did not neglect my other duties. Friendly service built repeat business. Over time our relationship became quite cordial and easy going. He was a very likable young man with an impish sense of humor but also a serious side too.

"Ah but you tempt me my little blond boy with your smiles and your shapely form. Indeed it is as the Imam Sufyan al-Thawri wrote on the subject of temptation, 'If every woman has one devil accompanying her, then a handsome lad has seventeen'. In your case I would make it twenty-seven. The Prophet Muhammad himself said: 'Beware of beardless youth for they are a greater source of mischief than young maidens'."

"But sir," I teased, "do not the poets praise the love of a man for a comely boy?"

Indeed, as rule, the beloved in Persian love poetry is not a woman at all but a young man who has caught the eye of the poet, whether a comely page, a handsome soldier, or a cute novice at a trade of profession.

"Ah, but the poets are merely bearing witness to the ethereal beauty of God in the form of a well-favored boy. The ecstasy those poems celebrate is born not out of base lust but from a chaste love of a grown man for a lissom youth. The sought after boy puts us in mind of the beautiful world given to us by Allah, the Compassionate and the Merciful."

For all his excuses, Persian love of youths was carnal and deeply ingrained in that culture. It began in boyhood when Persian boys use each other for sexual pleasure, the company of females being denied to them. Even after marriage grown men would seek out lovely boys, and the wine shop was a legitimate place for them to indulge their passion for lissom and pretty youths. Islamic jurisprudence generally considered that an attraction towards beautiful youths was normal, indeed only natural, for a grown man. After all, the veil concealed the faces of women outside a man's own family, and voluminous garments concealed their bodies. So why should lust men not turn their attentions to pretty boys trained to be skilled in the amorous arts and, as slaves, utterly complaisant.

Certainly there were many fine looking boys and young men held in slavery in those days. During its phases of expansion, Islamic armies carried off vast numbers of young male slaves, some to serve as pages at court or in the households of the well off or even as soldiers like the Mamelukes of Egypt and later the Janissaries of the Ottomans. Frolicking with boys was a favorite amusement amongst the Seljuk soldiery. The Seljuk elite very much preferred pretty blond boys as their paramours or houri boys. No one thought less of them for their inclinations. And it is not that they hadn't or wouldn't later take wives who would give them sons. Each to their own sphere: women were for procreation; boys were for carnal pleasure.

Rather like the geisha of Japan, the more gifted among the young male slaves were trained to be courtesans in the fullest sense of that word. They would serve wine at banquets and receptions, and play music and maintain their end of a cultivated conversation. Of course, their delectable bodies were also available as the evening wore on.

The intellectualization Persians put on these practices surely dates back to the Hellenistic period. Greeks poets too sang of their wine boys as objects of homoerotic passion. Then there was the pedagogical element in the love Greeks professed for boys. They fancied that the institution of man-boy love was absent in 'primitive' cultures. Among barbarians, a boy could learn all he needed from his own father. People in higher civilizations depended on experienced males to lovingly train boys to become men, with erotic attraction as the inducement.

I considered the poet's pious excuses to be a combination of hyperbole and denial, just a verbal smokescreen for drooling over the sight of pretty lads at the taverns, coffee houses and baths. Not to mention the boy brothels. My friend, the poet may have been fooling himself but he did not fool me. He wanted me all right, and I mean carnally, in the flesh, not just as an exemplar of the ethereal beauty of divinity. I know. I had seen the way his pupils widened when he looked at me, the flaring of his nostrils to take in my scent, the way he licked his lips.

Maybe I cannot read thoughts, but I can read faces and body language and interpret nonverbal auditory cues that others miss. My gift and the many centuries of life experience it have provided me, gives me insights into other people's intentions and emotions. I can almost always tell when someone is lying to me. I always know when they want me.

My master, a grizzled soldier named Barash, overheard our exchange and smiled. He was tolerant with me, I will give him that. Indeed he never abused me or the other three boys nor punished us without cause. He was what slaves call a decent master. So he knew that a bit of harmless flirtation with customers was all part of the service, and who knows, Rufi might one day finally plunk down his silver and take me upstairs. With an encouraging nod, Barash turned his attention to other customers.

One summer's day Rufi came by the wine shop early and rented me out for the entire morning and afternoon, though I would still have to entertain clients that evening. I was excited that finally the poet was ready to take me to bed. Now I liked Rufi a lot as a friend and he was really cute too, so I psyched myself up to give him the best sex of his entire life.

He surprised me. Instead of taking me to his home or to a room apart, he invited me to join him as his guest to the nude bathing pool on the river a couple of kilometers upstream of the city. The pool was a lovely spot along the life giving river. Shaded by trees arching over the river from the banks, the western side lapped the roots of several huge boulders larger than a house. The other bank was a sunny meadow.

Like the baths in the city itself, the pool was one of the few places where young men could get publicly naked, shedding thoser voluminous robes which were deliberately designed to conceal the outlines of the human body. Every boy longs for the freedom to be himself, to bare his limbs to the sky, to show off and strut his stuff in front of his friends and rivals.

The boys swam or dived off the highest rock over thirty feet (10 m) into a deep pool, each competing for the showiest dive. Others swam energetically back and forth or raced their friends. The lazy ones contented themselves with merely floating in the cool waters of the river, maybe sculling their arms and legs to help them to stay afloat. Young and slender, these boys were all bone and sinew and muscle with very little body fat.

There I finally got to see Rufi's sexy body and he viewed mine, what little of it he had not ogled already at the wine shop in my skimpy costume. We both liked what we saw. Rufi was lightly built but with the firm muscles and the sharp definition of a dancer. He told me that despite the languid appearance he cultivated, he trained daily with the sword and the bow. In warm weather he was a daily visitor to the pool where he would swim for an hour. Also he went riding three times a week. As for his taste for wine. I already knew he never over indulged. He made a show about drinking but really he could linger for an hour or two over a single cup of wine, careful to take food with it, nursing his drink, all the while pretending that, like a good Sufi poet, he was getting drunk.

Rufi's body was smooth and nearly hairless. He was bare at the fork of his legs, keeping his pubes clean shaved as is the custom with many Muslim youths. For good measure he shaved his pits too. He had nothing on his chest nor any treasure trail below his navel. His lower limbs had only the lightest dusting of fine black hair which looked good against his olive skin. Smiling, he lead me up to the diving rock and jumped off, tucking his legs in to a cannonball. I responded with a a nice swan dive the first time and a one-and-a-half somersault the next.

"Don't be such a showoff, Isakander." Rufi said scolding me gently for my fancy dives. "You will have the other boys panting after you. Remember you are my guest today."

He was right that my diving would attract the attention of those who like pretty youths. I am something of an exhibitionist so there I was shamelessly calling attention to my trim hairless body.

That was why, when I climbed out of the pool onto a rock, I deliberately paused as I lifted myself out of the water, my butt and cleavage on display, letting other males get a good look at my pert rump as the water sluiced off it. My slow walk toward the diving stone gave viewers a chance to ogle my perfectly formed buttocks as they dimpled fetchingly with my deliberate stride. As I waited for another diver, I stretched my arms upward in the shape of a diamond, just touching the tips of my fingers, flattening my belly, and tightening my glutei to accent their cleavage. Afterwards, I relaxed a moment then wind-milled my arms before bending over as if loosening up but really to display the curves of my shapely bum to best advantage. That earned me a sharp slap on my butt from Rufi.

"Give the rest of the boys a chance to catch a patron's eye, will you Iskander." he added, rolling his eyes at my blatant tactics. "With everyone oggling your ass, what chance do they have?"

"You certainly have nothing to worry about Rufi. No one could overshadow a youth as pretty as you. Don't you realize how utterly scrumptious you are?"

He said nothing in reply, though looking very pleased but also embarrassed by my sincere compliment.

Rufi really had nothing to apologize for. He was a classic Mediterranean beauty with a slight build much like my own: taut, tanned, and toned, but he was olive skinned with dark wavy hair and large grey eyes while I am blond and green-eyed. Standing together atop the diving rock we made a striking pair, one blond, the other dark, both young and pretty and ever so sexy, both of us smooth and hairless. We dove and swam for the longest while then climbed out and stretched out on the grass of the meadow side by side.

Rufi was curious about my past so I gave him a heavily edited resume of how I had been a merchant's apprentice in Tarsus when actually I was my own master. I talked of the defense of the town, of my own role in the militia, and how the general had taken me to his bed rather than have me slain outright.

"Oh what a waste that would have been, my pretty blond friend. A beautiful boy should be cherished and enjoyed, not killed out of hand. And you are a swordsman too, like me. Quite a good one to hear you tell the tale of Tarsus. Maybe we can practice together."

"It would have to be secretely Rufi. As both a Christian and a slave, I may not take up a weapon nor wield it against a Muslim."

He subsided with a nod, keeping his silence, looking me up and down. Since we were entirely naked the physical evidence of Rufi's attraction for me was unmistakable. His cock was plumping up and visibly lifting off his balls. He was giving me the kind of look that a male reserves for an object of his desire. So I asked him:

"Why is it that you do not reach out to me or let me embrace you? You have never sought me for pleasure, Rufi, though I know you want me. That much is obvious. As you can readily see, I find you terribly attractive too. I would give myself to you willingly and gladly, my friend."

"Ah, my lovely blond boy. Were you free, I would take you to my bed in an instant. Alas, you are a slave. Even though you are willing, it would be immoral for me to take advantage of you that way. After all, I had to rent you for the day, so we could be together in this delightful place. Willing or not, you are constrained by your servile status, and that is something I can never take advantage of.

"You see, Iskander, unlike most people who simply accept slavery as a normal part of society, I hate the very idea of people owning other human beings. Yes I know that our religion allows Muslims to enslave Christians, but I feel in my heart that no man should own another, regardless of his creed. Even a decent master like that Barash of yours has too much power over his slaves."

"Doesn't your Quran endorse slavery?"

"Yes, and so does your Bible, infidel boy!" he rejoined with some asperity. "What of it? Yes, I am glad that our Prophet forbade us Muslims from enslaving each other. A big step in the right direction, surely. By contrast your own scriptures endorse slavery wholeheartedly for anyone, so they are clearly inferior from a moral sense."

I surprised him by telling him that I agreed wholeheartedly with his views, and not just because I had fallen into slavery. Of course I could not tell him of my own long life and the many times I had been enslaved, but the vehemence of my words carried conviction. He looked at me, apologetically, and said:

"I only wish I had the wealth to buy you, lovely Iskander, and to set you free so we could be lovers and true friends."

Rufi then sprawled out on his back, eyes closed against the sun, not even looking at me. I felt love and gratitude for this fine young man, for his character and convictions, as well as a strong physical attraction. Hoping I was not being precipitate or going too far, I leaned over and licked the head of his cock as it lay semi-turgid on his belly. He sucked in his breath but made no move to stop me. He kept his eyes shut, as if in sleep and hence unaware of the way I was taking advantage of his defenseless and naked body. Fine, if that was the only way he would let me minister to his needs, I would go along with it. He was after all so very cute and sexy.

I toyed with his cock and balls, licking the shaft, kissing the glans, snuffling at his ballsac. I sucked one ball at a time into my mouth and sucked on it for a bit, laving it with with my saliva. Then I licked all the way down his now turgid shaft and took him fully into my mouth. He flinched and put his hands to my head but not to push me away.

"Oh yes, Iskander. Keep doing that, my lovely little wine boy. You are so very talented with your mouth. With just a moment's attention you have got my manhood fully aroused. I don't know when I have been so hard."

I could not reply other than with a naughty look and a smile then went to work on him in earnest. In short order I brought him to a shuddering climax as he grunted and gasped and spurted his seed into my mouth.

"No, don't swallow it all, Iskander. Please, Iskander ... share it with me."

I pulled myself up along his exquisite body and kissed him full on the lips, shoving my tongue deep into his mouth, my tongue dueling with his, thrusting, parrying, tasting, both of us savored his manly juices to the fullest. Meanwhile, our hands roamed over our bodies, touching, stroking, petting, squeezing, as we explored each other's boyish forms, all their muscles, planes, curves, and cavities. For someone who affected the languor of an aesthete, the poet's flesh was taut and firm. No couch lounger he, but an athletic young man at the peak of his physical powers, the very best sort of body to arouse my own libido. He was handsome too in a very cute and boyish sort of way. In short, my friend Rufi was quite the catch and I did my best to let him know how much I appreciated him.

I should say that I am attracted to two kinds of males, twinks and masters. I love sex with pretty boys, youths much like myself or Rufi, supercute twinks in modern terms. Also I crave sex with powerful older males too, like that scarred warrior I mentioned earlier in this narrative. The difference is that sex with another pretty boy is an erotic romp with someone my equal. We lads typically engage in sixty nine or trade off taking the active role. With a boy, I feel energized as we jump into bed and roll around kissing and laughing, sucking and fucking. Sex with another boy is an absolute delight. By contrast sex with an older masterful male, is a more serious matter, a response to a deep felt need or craving. With such a man I go all quiet and submissive, ready to follow orders, to sink to my knees and worship his manliness. If he wants to tie me up and take a strap or switch to me, that's OK too. I am there to be used, though within limits of course - light bondage and humiliation but no more than that. I am no masochist. I don't derive pleasure from the sensation of pain.

Chapter 3. Sea Change

That first day we consummated our new relationship in all the ways that two young, athletic, and enthusiastic males can physically express the love and attraction they feel for each other. Rufi, for all his initial reluctance to make love to me, was as accomplished in the amorous arts as he was in poetry. It was my happiest day in a long time.

Thereafter he rented me out for the afternoon once a week. He always took me away from the wine shop. He refused to rent me for a sordid quickie during my usual working hours in the evening, so I never took him upstairs to my room in the wine shop. Instead we spent our time at the river, in coffee shops, and at his home. Rufi was comfortably well off from family money though he was not a rich man in his own right.

Still he was troubled by his conscience and the difference in our status. Some months into our love affair, when I was sure I could rely on his loyalty, I broached my plan to him. I explained that the only practical way I could become a free person was to embrace Islam, to make a profession of faith.

Now the profession of faith is deceptively simple, a recitation of a short verbal formula. The hard part is persuading the authorities that your profession of faith is sincere and not a mere stratagem. After all, slaves were value property for which their masters had paid good money. Also the community of believers could not be tainted by poseurs, merely pretending to convert to the faith of the Prophet. I explained that I had a solution to both problems.

I would disarm Barash's potential opposition by essentially purchasing my freedom, showing him the location of a hidden cache of jewels and gold coins, one of many I had planted over the centuries against just such a need. To prove my sincerity to the jurists, I would show that I had memorized the Quran, something I had actually done three centuries before when posing as a Muslim. At the wine bar, Rufi and I would talk of his faith and of its superiority to Christianity. Patrons had always noted that our exchanges were highly intellectual, often about matters of philosophy, history, and aesthetics. So my gradual conversion to Islam would seem plausible. Their testimony along with Barash's and Rufi's, my literacy in Arabic and my knowledge of the Quran and the Hadith, the sayings and deeds of the Prophet Mohammed would all stand me in good stead.

Understand that I long ago abandoned the religion of my upbringing, the pagan gods and forest sprits of my youth in Germany. I have never really embraced another religion, not in my heart and mind. Very soon I realized that humans can live moral lives without reliance on deities or creeds. I am turned off by the superstition and fairy tales that encumber organized religions. I have no use for any creed. They are all flawed attempts by fallible humans to explain the unknown and to answer existential questions that probably have no good answers.

I have seen many religions rise and fall. Zorastrianism once prevailed from the Euphrates to the Indus only to be replaced by Islam. Christianity replaced the gods of ancient Egypt and the Levant until swept away by Islam. India saw the birth of Buddhism, which later went into decline in the land of its birth but flourished in lands far to the North and East. Hinduism has ancient roots but it really came into its own only during the Gupta period as I had seen for myself when I lived as a saddhu or monk in India in the sixth century. So I was ready to pose as a Muslim once again but not actually take up the faith.

If all went as expected, my plan to take at least six months though I would keep Barash in the dark about it till near then end. Only during the last month would I make my offer to Barash. As luck would have it, though my timetable held, I found my freedom in an utterly different way from what I had planned.

During my occasional time off, I was free to stroll about the city, having convinced Barash that letting me circulate the streets was a good promotional move. My physical beauty drew the attention of the more discriminating clientele, aided by the sexy clothes I wore: houri boy pants topped with an Aladdin type vest, the kind that did not cover anything except the pectorals in front and the shoulder blades in back. It did not close in front either, allowing a good view of my nipples and their gleaming golden rings. The vest was basically a decoration, intended to highlight the shapeliness of the upper male torso and to bare the midriff entirely, leaving a gap gap more than three hands wide between the bottom of the vest and the top of the pants.

Regular customers recognized me, nodded or chatted me up, and pointed me out or even introduced me to their friends along with a strong recommendation that they swing by Barash's place some evening and sample my charms. When strangers asked if I were for rent, I would simply tell them that, yes I was a wine boy who worked at Barash's, and that my time could be rented for two silvers for a half-hour's assignation. Also I was available for private parties off premises but not on my own account. All arrangements had to go through my master. I often went by the gates in the late afternoon, calling out to likely travelers, perhaps, touting the fine accommodations on offer. Barash provided lodging to legitimate travelers as well as food, drink, and boys. For me it was a learn my way about the city and to see new faces. Sometimes I clambered up to the rooftops and scrambled along that aerial highway for the sheer challenge of it.

One afternoon, a band of five travelers passed through the southern gate and spotted me lounging nearby. Though they had the look of hard men, they rode fine horses equipped with good quality tack and were all armed with swords and bows. They looked like they knew how to use them too. I suspect any bandits who spotted them on the road had let these fierce warriors pass by unmolested in favor of easier prey.

As they passed through the gate, my appraising gaze caught the eye of their leader, a tall lean fellow with a fine gold device set into his turban. Speaking accented Persian he said:

"Salaam, pretty one. You wouldn't be one of Barash's fine lads, now would you?"

"Indeed sir, I am. I take it you have heard of my master's establishment."

"Aye, lad. Friends tell me that his food is good, his wine is un-watered, his rooms are cool, and his boys are hot. That last I can see for myself is quite true."

I smiled at the compliment and chattered pleasantly with the man as we made our way into the city. Tariq told me that he was a soldier of fortune, an Arab from Syria, as were his men. I noticed that among themselves they spoke not Arabic but a form of Aramaic that few in those parts would likely understand. I was one who did, but I pretended otherwise on general principles, not out of any real suspicion at the time.

I delivered the riders to the stables out back where their mounts would be cared for then led them into the tavern proper where accommodations were quickly arranged. Naturally I was part of the deal. The men took two large rooms upstairs and rented me for the entire evening. Leading me to their rooms early, they stripped my clothes off and had their fun with me for a couple of hours, passing me around, often taking me two at at time, one in each orifice. I responded to their strong lean bodies and their no nonsense, take charge attitude, throwing myself into their energetic couplings with unfeigned enthusiasm.

During our couplings I heard one man suggest to Tariq that maybe they should take me with them after they settled accounts with Barash. I didn't like the sound of that at all but continued to pretend I did not understand Aramaic, answering only in Persian.

Afterwards, while they took a break to recoup their energies, they donned flowing robes and brought me downstairs. The other men wanted me to serve them at dinner entirely naked but Tariq had a better idea. He slipped my vest onto my shoulders but tossed my houri boy pants into a corner. The top was all that I would be allowed to wear. More decoration than garment, the vest made me feel incredibly slutty. There I was stark naked for all intents and purposes, my fine round rump entirely exposed along was my manhood. No wonder I got a painfully hard erection, my cock pointing straight up and lying flat to my belly.

Tariq used my erection as a handle to lead me downstairs, laughing at my full body blush. You would think that with all my experience I would be beyond embarrassment but I could not but feel both shamed and terribly naughty. It didn't help that Tariq and his friends kept up a patter of uninhibited talk among themselves and with the other customers, speaking of their fun with me upstairs, commenting on my attributes and skills in the amorous arts, all the while pawing me as I did my level best to serve them their supper. As I went back and forth to the kitchen, I had to run a gantlet of groping hands that nearly made me drop what I was carrying.

Finally Barash walked over to Tariq and had a quiet word with him.

"Downstairs in the main room, you may eat or drink. If you want to play with this boy, do it upstairs. Don't shame him so blatantly in public. Even slave boys have feelings."

"Ah, one of your special pets, is he tavern master?" Tariq rejoined, but he signaled to his men to desist nonetheless.

I flashed a grateful look at my master, thankful for his intervention. Thereafter the men left me in peace till it was time to take me upstairs once again.

You might think a full belly and several cups of wine each would have mellowed the five of them, but they threw themselves into lovemaking with renewed vigor. I was rammed and poked and prodded and thumped for several hours, as the men bent and folded and twisted my small body into all manner of positions. Tariq took me last, bending me over till my knees straddled my face, driving into my upturned ass with his long thick cock. He liked to pull all the way out and watched my battered and distended hole start to close up, then drive down into it, squelching and squishing in the manly juices his comrades had discharged into my fundament.

During the proceedings I overhead other comments that made me uneasy about these men. There was more talk of taking me along with them after they settled accounts with Barash. I didn't think that was a reference to paying their bill or even about purchasing me from my master. It was clear that they did not like Barash, though not for any reason I could understand then.

When they were all done with me, Tariq insisted I spend the night in his bed, my back and ass spooned to his chest and lap. Tired and sore, my body reeking of lovemaking, I slumped back against the man and quickly fell asleep.

I woke early but as is my wont I made no overt sign of it. From centuries of caution and experience I simply listened, orienting myself as to my situation and what might be around me. I remembered that I had fallen asleep with Tariq in his bed. From the low voices speaking Aramaic all around me, I gathered that the rest of his men had collected in his room for some kind of pow-wow. I feigned sleep even when Tariq stroked my morning wood, to test me.

It was just as well they thought me asleep and ignorant of their language. From their exchanges I soon realized that they were a team of assassins or rather vengeance seeker, who intended to rob and kill my master Barash.

It seems that several years earlier, in his soldiering days, Barash had commanded a cavalry force that destroyed two rebel villages in Syria inhabited by Samaritans, an ancient people who still spoke a form of Aramaic, the language of Christ. The Christians in those villages had sided with their co-religionists, the Byzantines, against the marauding Turks. It took quite some time for these five men, who had been away from their homeland at the time of the attack, to track down the enemy commander they held responsible.

Their plan was not just to kill Barash but to kidnap him and drag him out to some quiet spot in the desert for prolonged torture. His would be a horrible lingering death. Meanwhile the men had arrangements to make. Not only did they need fresh supplies and extra mounts to speed their travels, they also wanted to uncover the location of Barash's strong box. So they would not make their move till the wee hours of the following morning.

Centuries of assumed identities and fictitious backgrounds had made me an excellent actor. So when I was awakened by Tariq, I pretended to be clueless about their intentions. I stretched like a cat, smiled at Tariq and thanked him and the others for the exciting romp the previous night. Sniffing myself I made a face, saying I really needed to wash up. That provoked a chorus of ribald jokes and comments, as I walked out of the room.

Of course I immediately sought out Barash and told him everything. Why did I take his side, my slave master? I should explain that I did not resent him personally for holding me as a slave. Much as I hated the institution of slavery, by his lights he was doing nothing wrong. Also he was a decent man and quite likable as a person. He certainly did not deserve the fate his enemies had reserved for him. He thanked me for the warning, but he pointed out that we could not simply notify the authorities.

"First of all these men have not yet acted contrary to law. And no court would ever listen to your testimony, Iskander. You are a mere boy, a slave and a Christian. These men are Muslims, or at least they pretend to be. Yes, I know you name them as Christians but all Samaritans speak Aramaic and some are Muslim and other Jewish."

"What shall we do then, sir? Must we wait till they make a move?"

"I am afraid so. We have to catch them in the act."

Barash arranged for two old comrades to station themselves in the pantry off the kitchen near his own quarters, ready to come to his aid when the Samaritans made their move.

Sure enough, Tariq got up during the early morning hours, leaving me asleep in his bed. He and his men filed quietly downstairs to Barash's quarters intending to burst in on him and catch him unawares. Instead my master was up and about, armed and armored, braced for their attack. He held the doorway to his rooms against them while his two friends fell upon the five killers from behind. A hard fought battle at close quarters ensued, neither side disposed to grant quarter. It was kill or be killed.

The battle started to go against Barash and his men, even with the element of surprise, outnumbered as they were. Both of Barash's friends fell back from the fight, bleeding from wounds, one even losing his sword. The pair had to go on the defensive, both wounded and with only one sword plus a dagger between them.

I rushed in and took up that sword. Tariq's men made a grab for me but I was naked so they could not get a good grip. I spun around and lit into the killers relying on my agility, speed, and hard won skills. After centuries of training, practice, and combat experience, it was fair to say that I was just about the deadliest swordsman on the planet. Between the two of us, Barash and me, we finished off all of Tariq's men. My blade cut the tendons of Tariq's wrist disarming him. The man had no choice but to surrender.

With the testimony of Barash and his friends, the case against Tariq was a foregone conclusion. Still he tried to muddy the waters by accusing me of the crime of taken up arms against a Muslim. A Christian could be killed for such an offense. Fortunately the five Samaritans had tokens of their true faith secreted on their persons. So I got off because I had not actually attacked a Muslim. True, I had armed myself but in defense of my master, the intended victim, so that mitigated my offense. Barash also spoke up for me in court.

"Honored judge, " he began. "If the problem is that the boy is both a slave and a Christian, then let us change those facts. Iskander, I grant you your freedom unconditionally, though I also ask you to make a profession of faith. I have noticed how you have been talking these last months with our friend Rufi about matters of faith and religion."

Rufi chimed in to confirm the story that I had long contemplated converting to Islam. I proved I knew the Quran by heart, letting the judges select surahs for me to recite. That won me the support both of the judges and of the crowd. So then and there I made a profession of faith and officially became a Muslim, in the eyes of the law. Naturally I never embraced Islam in my heart. As a rationalist, I have no use for supernatural creeds of any kind.

In due course, I dug up my hidden hoard of gold and jewels, giving one fifth each to Barash and Rufi and keeping the rest for myself as a stake in the mercantile trade, at which I was soon quite successful. Barash invested his share in his business, which flourished. Rufi followed my advice on investing for the long term and gradually built up a comfortable fortune, making his family proud of him.

I stayed on in lovely Isfahan for another fourteen years, remaining on excellent terms with both men, though offering my charms only to Rufi. Our friendship flourished without the barrier of servile status between us. I like to think I inspired some of his best love poems, the ones about the blond wine boy with eyes the color of growing things.

I finally left the city only because my eternal youthfulness would soon have become apparent without a change of locale and identity. I sometimes think of my two good friends from Isfahan and of the beautiful city we lived in.

Epilogue

Sadly modern Persian society is extremely hostile to homosexuality. Boys and young men who express their affection and passion for each other can be arrested, imprisoned, and executed. I consider this intolerance to be a perversion of traditional Persian culture which I have long admired.

As for the city Isfahan, its metropolitan area is the second largest in the country with a population of three and a half million. The city center is still worth a visit for its outstanding architecture. The Naghsh-e Jahan Square in Isfahan is one of the largest city squares in the world a supreme example of Iranian and Islamic architecture. The city boast fine boulevards, covered bridges, rich palaces, and a flock of mosques and minarets. There is a Persian proverb that goes "'Esfah_n nesf-e jah_n ast" (Isfahan is half the world).

I rather took a liking to houri boy pants. Very sexy. I sometimes wear them around the house when I don't feel like being naked. Admittedly they are not the least bit practical for going out and about, something today's sagger boys don't seem to realize about their own fashion trend.

Is it just me, or don't you think these sagger boys are getting overly bold, maybe going a bit too far these days? This past summer, I saw young men going about with the waistband of their jeans riding below their buttocks or very nearly so, certainly on the underside of those delightful curves that grace the bodies of athletic young males. They don't have boxers on underneath either to cover their sweet cheeks. You could see at least half their cleavage -- sometime six inches (15 cm) are on display, and the lush globes of their tushes. Though the skin tone of some of the butts on display was lighter that their tanned chests and arms, in many cases the boys were evenly toned all over from sunbathing or swimming in the nude.

I must admit I relish those flushes of lust I get when a nice looking boy turns the corner, flashing his curvaceous bum. Some wear a shirt but one fully unbuttoned and open to the sides to facilitate a dramatic swirl. Others take their shirts off and have them dangling from a belt loop. Either way leaves practically the entire torso bared for all to see, from shoulders to rump and nearly to the crotch. These kids know exactly know what they are doing too, giving a toss of the head to flip their drooping locks out of their face, smiling, maybe running their hands down their flanks to their hips to frame their round rumps and their cleavage.

Now you might ask, why does a young man go about on a summer's day virtually undressed? Is it the better to to cope with the oppressive heat? Is it to work on his suntan? Or are these lads strutting their stuff in a none too subtle courtship display? The answer is obvious. I cannot find it in my heart to be too critical of the youth of today. These kids are young. It is their time. Their juices are flowing. Let them enjoy their youth and boisterous sexuality while they can, bless them.

The credit (or the blame, depending on your point of view) goes back to the teenagers of the 1980s. They took to showing their underwear under their walking shorts in the summer. At the time I smiled indulgently at what I considered a mild form of courtship display. Then they started wearing jeans really low on the hips but with boxer shorts covering them above the low rise waist. The next step was when long legged swimming trunks came into fashion, where the bottom brushed the knees but the waistband was down by the groin.

Of course wearing your pants that low is completely impractical except as a courtship display You can see that the kids are forever having to hike their pants back up. With the way the bottom of their pants legs bunch and pool around their ankles, you know that one misstep could drag them right off their precarious perch on the boy's hips. And in the summer that much fabric is stifling.

In defense of low saggers, I like to think that their insouciance about baring their asses in public in yet another step toward freeing society from unhealthy attitudes toward the human body and sexuality left over from our fading religious traditions. The societies with the strictest rules about covering the body are the Muslim societies where women may have to live full enwrapped in a burka, peering out at the world through a cloth grill. Even men may be punished for displaying any part of the body between the waist and the knee. Western societies are much more sensible though America is far behind Europe. Central Park in New York has nothing like the nude sunbathing in the Englischer Garten in Munich.

Now as much as I like to display my own trim body, you won't find me going around sagging like that. It is totally impractical. For one thing, you can neither run nor fight, always important to a cautious survivor type like me. That's also the reason why I wear real sneakers or walking shoes instead of flimsy flip flops. In Central Park, look for me running by in my Onionskin shorts or the skimpy tan-through shorts which I prefer for my parkour expeditions or for skateboarding.

Only recently could I write of these things, choosing, from caution, to cast them as fiction, a series of fanciful tales of an immortal youth written under a pseudonym. My secret is safe for no one in these days of modern science will believe it. In this tale, all of the names are real. The events described really did happen just as I have written.