Success is attractive. Only success.
Yet she found you attractive
For you alone were successful
At conquering her hardened heart
There are many walking wounds on earth
Many crusted souls aching for life
Think not that you are nothing
Simply because you never made it to that school
That job, that position, that wealth, that status…
It is also success to heal a human heart.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
You make me richer
The more I give to you
The well fills the pitcher
Lovingly. This is from me to you
Sings the well, a wishing well
No coin can grant the wishes
That kindness will, a kindness well
Your heart, a table of rare dishes
More profound than profundity
Wiser than the wisest sagacity
Where it stops – the world – there begins
Aye there begins Friendship, and wins.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
You have to go deep
To decipher the truth within
Deep enough to be unable
To come out again. Catch 22.
Then you will ask yourself
What use is the knowledge
If you cannot use it
To free yourself from the truth.
But humanity kicks in
The instinct for self-preservation
Some call it the third eye
The inner voice, the sixth sense.
Reason says go left
Yet your feet turn right
There is an inner road
That leads through the night.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Hardly a night goes by
Hardly a breath flows, an evening
Melts
Without this thought
You brighten my life
Curly windows
When the crowds are many
I am alone
I wanted to be a nightingale
To be a flower
I wanted to be a star
The evening wind blows
I am human. Let it be…
Sometimes again
Freed from the city’s shackles
Hackles, hard tackles
I am green, bright yellow, blue as sky
Glad am I.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Yes it was
A gone cause
Broken laws
Unbroken again
Spoken in vain
Your lovely name
Ours was
More than just a game
Hitherto thitherto
Lonely walk
Lonely stalk
Whereto?
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
All I can do
Is just sing my songs
Between currents of dawn
I am a tree
The Iroko said to the ground
I cannot be grass too
Nor wind that comes and goes
And sings with birds and scents
And distant tales.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Life
The bud struggling with itself
Longing to burst into flower
And sacrifice herself to the light
Nations locked in inner turmoil
Searching for the other half
Of the yellow sun
People thirsting for freedom
And then a Cadillac rolls past
A homeless person under the bridge
Their eyes meet in shock of recognition
They are the same
Or soon will be.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Zu erst Ärger, dann Faszination
Dann Widerstand, dann Resignation
Dann Glück, voller Hoffnung
Dann Schmerz, aus Enttäuschung
Dann Nachdenken, bis zum Begreifen
Dann Verständigung: zusammen reifen
Und jetzt bleiben nur zwei Dinge
Hochzeitskleidung und Hochzeitsringe.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Yes I’m a thief
I steal your heart
And you love it
And everytime I return it to you
You weep bitterly
And beg me to rob you again.
Beg harder.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
My friends are the improbable people
The ones you wouldn’t expect
Who never visit or party with me
Yet always show me respect
Who hide in the faceless crowd
And put in a good word for me
Who demand of me not company
But that I walk the path before me
Who even when we quarrel
Still never will betray me
Who tell me my failings to my face
But keep my secrets safely
Because I do the same for them
It is the way of friendship
The friends you rarely see me with
Are the ones you shouldn’t mess with.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 