A-Z Challenge: V is for Veil

(I'm totally cheating--this is an edited version of a post from an old blog...but this month has been crazy and I'm leaving for a trip tomorrow.)

Veils. 

On men.

Sexy. (And, for the purpose of this post, I am only talking about veils on men. This blog is not about religion or politics).

I read somewhere that there is no single facial feature that allows for universal
facial recognition. People have to be able to see the whole face in order to recognize someone. I think that's why some people react so strongly to veils of any kind, because so much of human relations are through the face. When they're upset by a veil, they're really thinking, "Ahhhhh!!!! I can't see his faaaaaace!!!"







Look at this guy! I can't see his whole face! He could have warts. He could have scars. He could be the most beautiful man on earth and I'll never know!

Veils add mystery to interaction, and most people don't like mystery unless they're specifically looking for it.

For me, that mystery is part of a veil's charm. Reading someone's emotions becomes limited to the eyes. Eyes are very expressive, but most Westerners are used to getting non-verbal cues from other parts of the face as well.




Veils keep a part of you hidden from the world. I don't just mean actual, physical veils, of course. They can hide a good thing, something you want to keep to yourself or those you're intimate with (or bad hair day. I'm just saying...), or it could be something you don't want anyone to see because you're ashamed of it, or it's a secret, or having it out for everyone to see would leave you too raw and vulnerable to function.






This blog doesn't have nearly enough naked men yet, so here!

I love this picture. The veil doesn't hide anything, it only draws the viewer's attention and makes the whole thing more sensual. You can't see the model's face, so he is effectively veiled.

I'm sure part of the romance of veils is, for me, the purely sensual side of them. Yes, there's the mystery, but there's also the feeling of soft, gauzy material on your skin, on one of the most sensitive parts of your body (the face). You can kiss through a veil, a la Victor Hugo, and it's a totally different experience. Even the familiar becomes new, exotic, erotic. I like walking around town with a scarf over my face and just my eyes showing during the winter. I'm invisible, or rather unidentifiable. I can be anyone and no one. People can only see my clothes and the colour of my eyes and skin.