Of Course, Faiza, Our Baby Akpa Arinzechuckwu My wife & I sit in silence. Nothing about our sitting is sacred, not even silence nor our blank gazes. If only briefly, Maria, take my lips
in yours. Point me in the direction of the qibla, show me how beyond the dark clouds
hovering over the bed of our youth, is the finger of Allah repositioning us from an impossible grief
to the fabled bed of roses. Touch me, like the night of our nikkah – two flamingos too shy of making magic,
stealing kisses – a peck a time till desire was made possible. Of course, even if only briefly, Maria,
this would be possible. Of course, we are in each other’s apartment, neither reaching nor feeling.
Of course, in our apartment, we sit in silence. Of course, there’s nothing holy about silence.
Of course, misery makes a person question the goodness of Allah, even His intentions.
Faiza, we had wanted to call her. Faiza because my wife swam out of grief victoriously.
But sitting in silence, it seems we swam from old grief to new grief. Ha-ha-ha. Ya Allah, surrendered
to the tickly fingers of grief, Maria pats my shoulder as we start laughing at the blood that would have been
our baby. Faiza, our signature against time.
Àkpà Árinzèchukwu is the author of City Dwellers. Their work has appeared or forthcoming from The Nation, Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Transition, The Southampton Review, Poetry Review, Adda, Fourteen Poems, Arc Poetry, Clavmag, Ake Review, Maroko, Dgëku, Saraba, and elsewhere. Nominated for both the Pushcart prize and Best of the Net, they are the winner of the Poetry Archive Worldview, shortlisted for the FT/Bodley Head Prize, and a finalist for the Black Warriors Review Fiction Contest.