By EZZA AMHED
Because I didn’t say Mashallah when she swapped her nose stud for a hoop and two days later I’m met by the bursting bulb of blood and pus which seals the fibrous innards of her nose cartilage on the outside sits the bulb pulsing expanding as if it’s breathing looks like a red evil eye ornament white pupil right at the center she has a nose growing out of her nose says I did this to her it’s all my fault should’ve kept my mouth shut if I wasn’t going to let God grace my compliment and I’m baffled slight peaks of nervous laughter rumble up my throat I didn’t mean to give it to you I say all the words Mashallah Alhamdulilah Subhanallah Allah-hu-akbar but it’s a little too late the evil eye is taking over her nose so we look up an old Islamic cure but decide against it because neither of us want to wash our mouths and limbs in the same water and in a few months the evil eye goes away and so does the piercing and we’ve made a joke of the whole thing but it’s become a lesson that nazr is real and so is
The divine in me
The river that moves inside me.
Ezza Ahmed is an educator and poet based in New York City. Her poetry is concerned with diaspora, memory, and water (rivers, creeks, lakes, etc.). Her work is in The Idaho Review, Ginger Bug Press, Sycamore Review, Apogee Journal, The Michigan Review, and Adi Magazine.
