NO HOME AWAY

I walk through the valley of pain on my own

By the time friends come I’m already gone

I am All the colours between black and brown

Call me Africa or call me Diaspora, a birded song

Fly without perching, there’s no home away from home.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river

HEART OF GOLD

There is a part
of your world -
Inside your heart -
It is Gold.

Beware of the gold-diggers
Beware of the prospectors
Remember Ghana or the Incas
Protect the gold inside your heart.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

WHY?

I cannot handle lies
like hot mounds of yam on a plate
smoking squinted eyes
thoughtfully tonguing open the gate
of questioning Whys
where Truth comes never or too late
to hear my heart’s cries.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

I LOVE A LOT

For the sake of love
I love a lot
For the sake of the love
which once I got
I love to love and love a lot
Without a plan, without a plot
Just for the sake of the love
which once upon a time I got
and never again forgot.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

THE THOUGHTS THAT ATTACH

I‘m looking for the pain
I can’t find it in all its usual hiding places
I go inside, check again
the box of fears, the memory full spaces
But I can’t find the rain.

Letting go of the thoughts that attach
Not every perfect catch is a perfect match
I cannot find the pain.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

GIVING

A broken heart
is a portal
to a misplaced chart
of an immortal

A soul bleeding
is a soulful river
It is quietly leading
you to the Giver.

To get you must give
give humility
The hardest way to live
Purity, simplicity.

The Giver’s Paradise
is only for the giving
even when he cries
he is still forgiving.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

FRONT AND BACK

Some will want
Wanting will be their front
Some will taunt
Taunting will be their front
Some will flaunt
Flaunting will be their front
And some will be gaunt
But it won’t be a front
It will be real, for wont
Of everything they want.
Everything they lack -
A place to call their own,
The feeling of being at home -
They want it back.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

EASTER

Tear the woods open wide
It is a painting windowed in our dream
Spear not the canvas to the side
The blood waters a never-ending stream
That will move mountains on Sunday
And roll a rock downhill
Into the valley of time we chime Monday
Death is dead. Peace, be still
The innocent should never be crucified
While the guilty die on their pen
Never was indignity this undignified
Justice thus unjustified by unmanly men
The innocent will rise again
Broken the frame of your crown of lies
Sunrays that fall like drops of rain
A Spirit is born when a man dies.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

HUMAN GUITAR

A window into another world you are
Smaller than a moon you are a star
Nearer than proximity you feel from afar
Sealed to others my heart to you is ajar
You’ve got a ticket I’ve got a fast car
I am the wound you are the tender scar
Strumming my pain fingering my guitar.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river

UNMISSING YOU

I miss you but missing you
hurts less than kissing you
So I miss you for missing you
Is how I get to stop missing you.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Poems from the inner river