A festival story. The characters are imagined; the clothes are real.
At five to seven I laid the back of my hand on the new plank, and it came away wet.
"Then we wait," said Marthese.
She sat on an upturned crate at the head of the slipway, cap pushed back: gold Flower of Life lattice on black, a small gold eye at the front. The only eye on this harbor she hadn't painted herself. Below us the luzzijiet rocked at their moorings, and most of their bows watched the water with a pair of her eyes.
Ninu's boat sat on the trestles in front of me. In August a plank at her port bow had split; the shipwright let in a new one, primed it and laid the blue. The starboard eye was still there, Marthese's from the March repaint: a white almond, an ochre iris, a black pupil, a blue lid sweeping back into a brow. The port side was bare blue board.
At twenty to seven tonight the boats would leave the quay for the sunset flotilla, out under the old bastion where the festival was building its stage, with Ninu's boat in front. Ninu doesn't go to sea without both eyes. Not to fish, not for a festival, not for anybody.
"You paint it," Marthese had told me yesterday. "I don't touch a brush. Ninu looks at four. If he says no, I paint over it, and his boat goes out last."
I'm nineteen. I'd swept her floor and mixed her colors for two years. I had never painted an eye on anything that floats.
The sun climbed. The dew stayed.
✦
At twenty past ten the plank was dry under my hand.
Marthese had traced her starboard eye onto brown paper and pricked the outline with a pin. I flipped the sheet, because the eye for the other side is the same eye backwards, taped it to the bow and patted the chalk bag along the holes. A ghost eye in white dots looked out over the harbor.
"Thin," said Marthese from her crate. "This air holds water like a sponge. Thick paint stays soft till Tuesday."
I laid the white of the eye. Then I looked at the fish-market clock and laid it a little heavier, to be done sooner.
By eleven a bead of white was creeping out of the lower lid like a tear.
"Sag," said Marthese, and turned a page of her newspaper.
My ears went hot. I wiped the whole white off with a rag and thinner and started again, thin, at twenty past eleven. Seven hours and twenty minutes, and in this air every color needed time to skin over before the next could touch it.
✦
The iris went on at one: ochre, the same yellow as the mustaċċ band along her side, the yellow this harbor paints its boats.
Then the lid line: one long blue stroke from the inner corner, up and over and back into the brow, the stroke that makes an eye look out instead of just sitting there.
My hand wouldn't hold still. I braced it on Marthese's mahlstick, an old bamboo pole with a rag ball tied to the end, and the tip of the liner still shivered like a compass needle.
"Breathe out on it," Marthese said. "Never in."
I breathed out. The brush shook.
Then, up on the bastion, the soundcheck started.
A kick drum, round as a stone dropped down a well. Congas. Shakers. Afro house, rolling down the fort wall and out across the water. For two years Marthese has taken pencils off me because I drum on everything. My foot was already going.
I let it. One, two, three, four. On the next one I set the brush at the inner corner, breathed out, and pulled across four beats. The blue went up and over and back into the brow in one line, steady as a rope drawn through a ring.
When I lifted the brush my arm was trembling. The line wasn't.
The pupil went in at two. At three, when it had skinned over, I stepped back to the edge of the slipway to see the eye the way the sea would. Afternoon light came off the water and lit everything except the eye. It looked painted. It looked shut.
Without asking anyone, I loaded my finest brush with white and set one small fleck in the pupil, high on the left, where the water's light would sit.
Marthese's newspaper came down. She looked at the fleck for a long time. Her own eyes have never had one.
She said nothing at all.
✦
Ninu came at four in his deck boots, fifty-something and built like a bollard. Every dawn before he casts off he lays his palm flat on the starboard eye. I've watched him do it from my aunt's chandlery window since I was small.
He looked at the port eye. He walked under the bow to the starboard side and looked at Marthese's. He came back.
"It's not hers," he said.
Marthese stood, pried the lid off the tin of blue, and picked up the wide brush.
✦
"Leave it," said Ninu.
He looked at the fleck. Then he lifted his hand toward the eye, palm flat, and Marthese and I said "Wet!" together, and he stopped an inch from the paint and held it there, the way he does at dawn, while the bass rolled down off the fort.
"Tomorrow, then," he said, and went to fuel up.
Marthese pressed the lid back onto the blue. She sat down, pulled off her cap and rolled the brim between her fingers, the little eye turning over and over.
"Twenty-four years ago," she said, "I painted my first eye on this boat. He said no. I painted over it at four, and he went out last."
"He was right." She set the cap back on and climbed the trestle on the starboard side with my finest brush. "He's right today, too."
She set a fleck of white in her own eye, high on the right, where the water's light would sit.
Then she came down and handed me the brush, handle first.
✦
At six I changed in the chandlery's back room. Overalls off. On went my Temple of Horus tee, cobalt and purple, four glassy sea-green wings rimmed in gold spread across the chest, and my Celestial Temple shorts, navy and violet and gold filigree, with an eye inside a gold triangle at the waistband.
Marthese looked at the shorts. "More eyes," she said. From her, that's a speech.
At twenty to seven the paint was dry to the touch, just. Ninu held out a hand to help me aboard. "Painter rides the first night," he said. "My boat, my rule."
We led them out, twelve luzzijiet in a line, engines low, the sun going down orange over the harbor mouth. People lined the bastion parapet, and the DJ dropped the kick back in under a vocal I couldn't follow and didn't need to. As we passed beneath the wall I found one gold cap among all those heads, and its owner lifted a hand to me, palm flat.
At the bow, my eye and her eye looked out over the water with the sunset sitting in both of them.
✦
I danced on the bastion until the last set, the wings on my chest going violet, then gold. Marthese danced too, small and exact, as if laying a line.
At first light we sat on the bastion steps with the sea turning from pewter to blue. Down on the quay, Ninu stepped aboard in his deck boots, leaned out over the bow, and laid his palm flat on my eye.
Then on hers. Then he cast off, and both of them went out to sea with the light in them.
The tee, the shorts and the cap from the slipway
Temple of Horus has crossed a storm-dark mountain lake in The Eye Made Whole and climbed a rain-slick Greek cliff in Arm's Length. Here it rides at the bow of a luzzu, the Maltese fishing boat whose painted eyes have long been called the Eye of Horus or of Osiris. The art spreads four glassy sea-green wings, rimmed in gold, over cobalt and purple, and Ylenia's flotilla shirt is the Temple of Horus cotton T-shirt ($60), the wings spread across the chest.
Her eye-at-the-waist pair are the Celestial Temple unisex cotton shorts ($65), navy and violet with gold filigree, glowing orbs and an eye inside a gold triangle. Marthese's cap, the only eye she never painted, is the Mystic Eye Gold snapback hat ($40): a gold Flower of Life lattice on black, with a small gold eye above a blue Flower of Life orb at the front.
- Cotton T-shirt: 100% cotton, listed fabric weight 190 g/m² · short sleeves · crew neck · regular fit, XS–5XL.
- Cotton shorts: 100% cotton, listed fabric weight 245 g/m² · straight leg · elastic waistband · side pockets plus a back pocket · S–5XL.
- Snapback: 100% poly, listed fabric weight 150 g/m² · one size fits most · adjustable snapback closure.
- All three: dye-sublimated, so the colors won't fade and the image won't crack, and made to order.
Dress for your own harbor night: cotton T-shirts · cotton shorts · snapback hats
What should you wear to a festival in Malta in September?
Dress for a warm, humid night. September evenings in Malta stay around 70°F (21°C) with humidity near 77%, so breathable cotton wins: a printed tee and shorts, a cap for the afternoon sun, and shoes with grip for stone ramps, quays and bastion steps. A light layer is a choice, not a must.
- The numbers: at Luqa, September averages a 70°F (21.2°C) low and an 83°F (28.6°C) high, with the sea near 77°F (Climate of Malta). Late afternoon sun on limestone is the hottest part of the day.
- The Afro house dress code: earthy, warm and made to move. Natural fibers, bold prints, gold and deep blues, and nothing that traps heat through a long set of congas and shakers.
- Old forts and harbors: bastions mean stone ramps, steep steps and worn edges. Flat soles with grip beat sandals, and a cap with a brim keeps the glare off the water out of your eyes.
- Respect the working harbor: the painted boats are fishing boats. Admire the eyes from the quay, keep your hands off wet paint and moored hulls, and give fishers room on the slipway.
For the same season by the water, CRSSD brings house and techno to San Diego's bayfront Waterfront Park each late September, though its nights run cooler, at 55–62°F, so pack the layer you'd skip in Malta.
Frequently asked questions
Why do Maltese fishing boats have eyes painted on them?
The pair of eyes on a luzzu's bow is a protective charm, said to watch over the fishermen at sea. The eyes are known as the Eye of Horus or the Eye of Osiris, and the custom may come down from the ancient Phoenicians, who shared it with the Egyptians and Greeks.
What is a luzzu?
A luzzu is a traditional Maltese fishing boat: wooden, carvel-built and double-ended, painted in bright yellow, red, green and blue, with a reddish-brown band at the waterline and a painted eye on each side of the bow. A few hundred still work today, nearly all motorised, many in the harbor at Marsaxlokk.
How warm is Malta at night in September?
Warm. September nights in Malta average about 70°F (21°C), and days reach the low to mid 80s°F (about 28.6°C at Luqa). Humidity runs near 77%, and the sea stays close to 77°F (25°C), so most festival-goers dance in a tee and shorts and carry a light layer only for the boat ride or sunrise.
Written by Magus & Lylyth Fawn, the Los Angeles artists behind Magus Fawn. Magus makes VR and digital visionary art and produces Psy EDM. Lylyth makes fractal digital art and runs design and customer care. We've been selling wearable art since 2020 on Etsy (4.7★ from 144 reviews as of October 2026) and here at magusfawn.com. Come say hi on Instagram @magusfawn.
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