Steven Harvey
One Boy's Luminous Skin

It is butter. The sun’s pillow. The moon’s snow. His eyes with large brown irises are a woodsy invitation to a boy’s life. They glitter with a hint of mischief too, but I’m talking about skin.

One boy’s luminous skin.

His teeth are a little goofy with two adult front teeth and some baby teeth in the back, but I’m not talking about them. A cowlick sends his hair awry—and that matters because my grandson has a cowlick in the same spot—but I won’t be diverted here.

Consider one boy’s luminous skin,

smoothed by some divine sculptor, ready for a grandfather’s thumb to wipe off tears or stains or blood.

One boy’s skin,

the tough epidermis, the dermis webbed with nerves made for pain, and the subcutis gloppy with glands and arteries and veins and blood—so much blood.
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