A man searches for
The man in the mirror
A woman searches
For the
Woman in the water
A man will stand his ground
A woman will wet her ground
I don’t understand gender roles
But I understand tender truths.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
English
THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE
TWO MEN in search of fortune.
Said the first:
“I will stay and farm my father’s land!”
Said the second:
“I will go and find the Wheel of Fortune, and I will turn it in my direction, and I shall possess it and I shall wield it, and I shall be a controller of happenings, a decider of destinies.”
Said the first:
“You will come back and beg me for a little plot of land on which to farm.”
Said the second:
“You will seek me and plead with me to turn your fortunes around with the Wheel of Fortune.”
Said the first:
“You cannot find the Wheel of Fortune. It is not a physical thing that can be grasped with the hand or seen with the eye. It is a power which started as a concept. It is everywhere.”
Said the second:
“It is a power which started as a concept and ended up as a wheel, a physical wheel that can be grasped with the hand and seen with the eye. I will find it and I will place a firm hold on it. It shall be mine. The Wheel of Fortune. Fortune!”
Said the Spirit of Fortune:
“The sooner you start, the better.”
The years have gone by and still he seeks. Through fortune and misfortune, through pleasure and pain, he seeks the wheel of fortune, that he may become a controller of happenings, a decider of destinies.
Said the first:
“The years have passed. Fortune, which smiled at me in the first few years, frowns now upon me. The harvest is meager. The earth sits hard upon me. Where is my friend who went to seek the Wheel of Fortune? I must find him. He will surely turn the wheel in my favour, and the winds shall turn in kind.”
Said the second:
“The years have passed. My wandering feet thirst for rest, my restless heart for peace. I have searched everywhere, in vain. I must return to my friend. Surely he will find for me a little plot of land where I can seek my fortune and fulfil my destiny.”
Said the Spirit of Fortune to the first:
“The sooner you go, the better.”
Said the Spirit of Fortune to the second:
“The sooner you return, the better.”
They met again upon the Highway at the halfway point between the going and the returning.
Said the first:
“My friend, have you found the Wheel of Fortune now? For you must turn it my way. The soil is unyielding, the farm is fruitless.”
Said the second:
“No, I have not found the wheel of fortune and was just on my way to you, that you may find me a little of your land where I may seek my fortune, for the road grows weary beneath my feet.”
Said the first:
“But you assured me that the Wheel of Fortune is a findable physical thing.”
Said the second:
“And you assured me that the land would one day support both of us!”
Said the first:
“The land is a deceiver, now I know. It is the whore of fortune and his worthless plaything! I shall go now and find the Wheel of Fortune. Then shall I own the land.”
Said the second:
“Oh, my friend, but you err. Fortune has no wheel. Myths have given birth to this belief. The land is the key to fortune. The land is the wheel of fortune. Possess the land and you have grasped fortune’s wheel.”
Said the first:
“I have turned the land several times, sometimes with my pitchfork, other times with a multitude of other implements such as my shovel, my hoe and my fingers, but not once did my fortune lastingly turn, although I turned the earth repeatedly. Sometimes the winds turned, briefly, but fortune never really. Thus I act with full clarity today. You can have the land if you wish. I shall find the Wheel of Fortune and I shall posess it and I shall wield it and I shall be a controller of happenings, a decider of destinies.”
Said the second:
“When you return to me, begging me to return your father’s land to you, I shall not do so. For it is now mine! Bear this in mind.”
Said the first:
“When you come to me, pleading with me to turn the Wheel of Fortune in your favour, I shall not do so! I shall abandon you to your fate. Bear this in mind.”
Said the second:
“Oh, you fool, why will you not come that we may together plough the land?! Two pairs of hands will soften its heart. There is no physical Wheel of Fortune! It is a power that began as a concept.”
Said the first:
“Fortune is a person. He bears a face and owns a wheel. I shall find him and I shall take the wheel from him. Then shall I turn the wheel against him. My wheel.”
Said the Spirit of Fortune to both:
“The earlier you proceed, the better.”
The years passed by like the wind, and old age crept upon them. The land softened and yielded rich harvests, but Fortune and his wheel refused to be found.
Said the first:
“I am old and grey. My days are numbered, my memories rich and poor. I shall return to my father’s land and there shall I lay down, for I do not want to die upon the road.”
Said the second:
“I am old and grey. My days are numbered, my memories many and few. I shall set off again after the Wheel of Fortune, that I may turn it and prolong my life and reactivate the youth in me. If I die now, all is lost and I shall be buried upon another man’s land. But if Fortune, who has smiled at me through the land, permits me now to find his wheel, then I shall change the course of my future.”
Said the Spirit Fortune to the first:
“Hurry, hurry, time is.”
Said the Spirit of Fortune to the second:
“Hurry, hurry, time is.”
Their paths crossed again, this time at the junction that leads everybody on.
Said the first:
“Why are you here? Have you not mastered the land which for you is the wheel of fortune?”
Said the second:
“I am tired of you. Please, move out of my way. Your father’s land is there. You can have it if you wish. Die on it; you are old enough for that now. I will have nothing to do with it anymore. It has brought me nothing but comfort, and prevented me from seeking the Wheel of Fortune, which was the ardent spiritual goal of my youth! Look at me: now I am an old man.”
Said the first:
“Then you shall die upon the road. I hope somebody finds you and buries you. I shall conclude my earthly wanderings there where I belong.”
Said the second:
“Rest in peace. Adieu.”
And then they parted ways, never to meet again upon the earth.
Said Fortune:
“Another twist, another turn,
And life goes on…
If they ask, or seek, or yearn
All I can do is turn and point them on…
The path they must go themselves –
The change they must work themselves
The moment they must grasp themselves –
The seeds of fortune they must sow themselves –
I am just a referee…
“Though men pass me by a thousand times
Never do they recognise me;
Nor is it necessary, as long as they heed
The Inner Voice in them that speaks to me.
“For I must obey, I must obey…
And place what they ask for upon their way.”
—–
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
AMNESIA
It’s so easy to forget
Who you are
The longer you live like them
With them
Amongst them
Sleep is depth
Is debt
Is death
The greatest treasure on earth
Is memory
Spirit, it’s so easy to forget
Who you are
On Earth.
Everything seems normal
To sleepwalker.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
MEMORIES
The beach was a friend
Whose waves like fingers
Wrapped themselves around
The hooves of the horses on
Which Kwame and I flew across wet sand
And Daddy took lost pictures
In the background, barefooted
While Mummy and Azuka
Laughed at us cheerfully.
Bar Beach on a Saturday
Long gone away.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
HANDS
Hands that grasped together
The bonds that heal and hold
And spun together warm threads
Into blanket against cold
And together formed fists that struck
At foes, firmly and bold
Hands that aged together, lined by
Love that never grew old.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
NATION
Nation must dig deep into
The luminous garden of soul
For new spirits must incarnate
Nation must dig deep into
The forgotten regions of soul
For sleeping spirit must awake
If we don’t change inside
Nothing will change outside.
We will merely pile up academic degrees.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
A DREAMER’S MIND
I see a mountain
In the distance
A mysterious mind
Over matter
The birds that circle its heights
Like higher thoughts
That hover above a dreamer’s mind
Seeking to make contact
For oft the thoughts we think
And think are ours
Are borrowed
Upon a lazy afternoon, somewhere
In Creation.
A child sits somewhere unseen
Locked in an old body
Each time it smiles
Rainbows and rainbows of new thoughts
Surge out, unite, swing forth, to go seek out
Like-minded wonderers dreaming lazily
Upon a quiet moment, somewhere
In Creation
Blindly receiving the seeds of new thoughts
And thinking the thoughts they think
Are theirs alone
As if the mind of a dreamer
Were not a fertile garden too.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
THE SPLIT
I’m quiet tonight
Never mind that it’s morning
I’m still dreaming
I remember a friend
We had high hopes for his future
Yet he chose the Easy
Now I’m all alone
On the road we once chose together
Watching it grow longer
This pain I keep inside
Greater than death, worse than loss
Treachery’s dungeons.
If I doubted reincarnation
This life has taught me a bitter lesson
For I must come again
The work is unfinished
The cards will be reshuffled
I will come again.
Then I hear, so soft
The sounds of morning dawning
The past is over now.
Those words, those strange words
That baffle the minds of politics
Of culture and science
You can call me Fool
You can call me mad, and yet
You too will come again.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
TREACHERY
Was I not perhaps there with them, beneath the bombs and amidst the bullets and amongst the kids that died too easily, too early, and never rose again? Was I not perhaps there with them amidst the hoping and the despairing and the neighbours that turned too easily, too quickly, too happily, into foes – was I not really there? Aye, was I not perhaps there too, I wonder, was I not? I sometimes seem to see again the metalbirds dropping parcels of eager death and ripping the way open for birth, the painful birth of a new generation unafraid of guns, bombs and nuclear threats, and wary only of the little lies that neighbours and friends are ever wont to tell.
——————–
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
——————–
Six Word Story: LUCK
And then there she was, again.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 