''What is love,'' Bill Bradley, the presidential contender, asked yesterday, ''in a larger context?''
It was a classic Bradley moment -- a politician posing a professor's question, an enigmatic close to his discussion of how important it is to live up to the expectations of the people who care: your teachers, parents, and friends.
His audience of middle-school students, however, didn't know quite what to make of it.
They also seemed a little surprised at the detailed answer he offered to a smart question from a student: ''If you're giving free health care, are taxes going to rise up?''
Bradley's reply went on for several minutes, culminating in the hope that Internet technology would ultimately yield huge savings in health care administrative costs.
But the students at Roxbury's Nativity Preparatory School seemed entranced when Bradley stuck to their concerns -- and his life story.
Bradley said he decided to visit the school during his campaign swing through Boston yesterday because its stress on values, service, and rigorous academics impressed him. The 63 boys, in grades 5 through 8, have a school day that begins at 7 a.m., when they clean the small Roxbury schoolhouse, and ends at 9 p.m., after a supervised two-hour study session.
Principal Alfred J. Hicks asked the boys to welcome Bradley, even though Bradley had played for ''the dreaded Knicks.''
Bradley then launched into a parable about a hermit and stories about sports, including this one: ''Michael Jordan got cut from his high school team ... but he made himself a great player by practicing.''
There were also stories about himself.
Many of the adults listened attentively, as if this were a Sunday sermon or their grandfather retelling a story about his childhood. The students leaned forward in their chairs and looked up at the 6-foot-6-inch candidate. One asked for his autograph, provoking a crush of little signature-seekers at the end of the hourlong event. Bradley obliged.
At one point, a student asked who his role models were.
Bradley recalled his father, who was immobilized by spinal arthritis, and his mother, who tied the patriarch's tie and made sure her son studied; he also cited teachers who sparked his interest in history.
Earlier in the day, Bradley held a press conference to introduce his volunteer state committee leaders.
Bradley named four: Harvard professor Cornel West, his campaign adviser on race, chosen for his ''depth of understanding''; a former on-court competitor, Celtics star John Havlicek, who ''still feels my fingerprints on his back''; former US representative James Shannon, ''a valuable counselor'' who served on the US House Ways and Means Committee with Bradley; and Nikki Tsongas, widow of US Senator Paul Tsongas, whose low-key, cerebral 1992 presidential bid is often compared to Bradley's.
''She lived through what I'm living through,'' Bradley said.
Tsongas said it's Bradley's ''willingness to be very honest ... that is very compelling. That's what I valued in my husband.''
Neither West nor Havlicek attended the announcement.
