How something so good
Can just suddenly spoil
You would be so surprised
What’s hidden in the soil.

How success and fulfilment
Can defy time and toil
You would be so mortified
What’s hidden in the soil.

How the hand that loved
Can suddenly recoil
You would be so horrified
What’s hidden in the soil.

The human heart is a garden,
A kitchen, a fertile soil
And strange things happen
When things come to the boil.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river