Bernard cocks his head to the side, a pigeon casting a glittering, incurious eye up at the screen. Without faces, I say, the men have no identity. The TV sends radiant light over the left side of his brown face, across the shoulders of his black leather jacket. On the barstool next to me, Bernard Watkins slouches over his beer, gazing into the dim mid-distance. I turn away from the monitor, suspended from the darkened ceiling. Now, on the TV angled overhead, each headless torso is no more than a soft-porn close-up of nipple, crotch, and butt.
Before the video camera cropped them at neck and knee, these were living beings. Near-naked, their bronzed muscles stretched by steroids and molded by Nautilus machines, a cross between Popeye, Mister Clean, and the Michelin Man. Where are their faces? Friday night, and dozens of headless musclemen on video, strutting at some outdoor gay-pride event.
