It was autumn when we met
Trees were reddening
Leaves were falling
Hearts were aching to spill the truth
Autumn, autumn
Cooler nights
Autumn, autumn
Mistier heights
It was autumn when we met
Days were shortening
Eyes were focusing more sharply
On every strange new thing –
To discern the whole truth
Before the snow-blanket
Stored any promises
About to be made –
Diamonds and promises are forever.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
To make a promise to love another person, forever, and then to break this promise and say, Goodbye baby… awakens within the hearts of everybody who hears of it a memory of their own broken and unspoken promises.
Noise everywhere. Noise in my head. Noise even in the centre of silence. Lovers are what sages once were, and vice versa. Heartbreak and promises, togetherness, farewells and silence are all trying to resolve themselves within our hearts.
I should never have told you that I loved you, but how could I but not tell the truth? Evermore I understand the importance of silence. Our hearts are broken in silence: a small token to pay for the new powers which soon and steadily awaken in silence within us.
One who can bear the pain of heartbreak; one who can say goodbye and yet always be there; one who can preserve promises in silence unbroken; will read these lines with a knowing smile.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Blessed are the silent
For they shall hear it first…
Blessed are the silent
For they shall hear it first.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Wie riecht die Farbe lila?
Wie klingt softe Vanilla?
Wie sähe er aus
Zöge ein Gedanke von dir aus
Als wärest du sein Haus?
Auf die Kleinigkeiten, gib Acht
Jedes schmeckt anders, wenn es lacht
Anders als geplant oder gedacht
Wie Machenschaft, Machen und Macht.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
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ps – die letzte Zeile dieses Gedichts schwebte bereits seit einigen Tagen in meinem Kopf. Die Zündung kam dann von unerwarteter Seite. Die siebte Frage einer Tagging-runde von der Bloggerin Sinn.Wort.Spiel brachte auf einmal den Ball ins Rollen… 🙂
Ich stufe dieses Gedicht wegen ihrer direkten zündenden Frage “Wie riecht die Farbe lila?”, die zum Anfang des Gedichts wurde, zumindest als halb-duett ein 🙂
You make the principal choice only once, and then it drives you along its lanes. When you change, you change solely within these lanes, upwards or downwards, or round and round. You fix the terminal points of your destiny, and that is your life.
But fear not. The principal choice is the answer to who you are, always, and always is forever, and forever holds light for every spirit.
Poets remain poets,
comedians remain comedians,
lovers remain lovers,
leaders remain leaders.
Healers will be healers,
teachers teachers,
builders remain builders,
dancers remain dancers,
and weavers will always weave something.
Mountains remain mountains, be they on land or under the sea.
Women remain women, and children stay children, earthlife after earthlife.
Thoughts ever will strike me, once, and before they strike again, I would have written a poem for them, as a surprise, because I am just like that.
Friends remain friends, men remain men, and what we seek remains all we have.
Choices and lanes, changes, destinies and life.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
In everybody’s deepest heart
Towering and strange
A something which no map can chart
And beyond every range
The mountain of longing
This must be love, this must be love
Immortally the same
Through every mile of earth it dove
Seeking nor friend nor fame
Out in the distant sea it grows
Re-calling you and me
Out in the distant fields it snows
On in infinity
This must be life, this must be life
This must be where we were
You are my heart, my joy, my wife
Here, there and everywhere…
The mountain of longing.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Gold glitters, but if all that glitters were gold, the world would be a place of great glitter and much emptiness.
Dawn ever arrives. No matter how dark the night, it will melt away when dawn awakens the travelling sun, and there will be laughter when you hear the voices of children playing in the morning…
Songs are a thing that are born mysteriously, and every moment everywhere hath its own songs too and there is no end to songs and games – and this has often mystified me.
And loneliness is a guest that comes and goes as he pleases, and once you get used to him, he becomes easy to live with and, together, both of you achieve many things which on your own you could not achieve, even if the whole world were to aid you.
There are some masterpieces which only lonely artists can create. There are some wars which only an army of lonely soldiers can win. There is a certain love which only two lonely hearts can share with one another. And loneliness seeks itself in you – but when loneliness goes away from you again, do not follow.
I am not strong. But when I unite with golden dawn and lonely songs, they make me the canvas on which they paint their dreams, and I am strong again. And free.
Gold and dawn, songs, loneliness and strengths.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
The tree you planted in my heart
Has grown strong…
The longer we remain apart
The more to each other we belong…
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
It must be hard for you
To be the subject
– or is it the object?
or is it the heart? –
Of so many poems.
When you stumble, remember:
I love you and you love me
Even if there be no poems
Even if there be no songs
No mountains, no photos, no words…
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Our dreams do not die, but when we misinterpret them, we make fools of ourselves. Big fools. But it is love again that maketh the biggest fools of us all, especially of poets and dreamers.
I dream my dreams, I write my poems, but still the nearest I come to the love in my heart are these words on paper that I write. And it is not me that you love, but my poetry. And fools continue to dream and poets continue to write love-poems and I continue to change.
But I do not believe the myth, oh no. The younger you are, I know, the deeper you love. Love does not make fools of youths, only of adults.
My chest hurts. It is cold somewhere strange and far…
How really good are the things I write? If you knew the amount of pain and loneliness, the pressure of gleaned recognition, the deep sorrow under which I write them down, my friend, you would read them gently and tenderly and with a thought for all those who labour away but are called fools and dreamers by those for whom they also write. Aye, if you knew the pain mingled with the ink which write these lines, you would weep for everybody on earth and beyond.
But do not cry for me… when I write, I shed my pain.
But she never goes away, my love, like a deer. She is only shy and a little wary of strange men, and all men are strange. I’ve been to many places, but no place ever confounded me quite like the heart of the woman I love. It was a room of mirrors and all I see was myself everywhere. But so would everybody else too who found their way into her – and yet her heart does not lie. It only reflects the truth. So I got mad and smashed her heart… and – what do you know? – instead of hating me for causing her pain, she loved me fiercely for freeing her from her loneliness and fear.
Poets seek love – and find poems…
Fools seek love – and find dreams…
Seekers seek truth – and find love…
Love and poets, fools, dreams and seekers.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 