Human characters incarnate
And re-incarnate.
Each stay on another Earth is but
A continuation.
It is limited by time and
Saturated by responsibility.
There is a task…
– this is the objective happening,
always to be borne in mind.
The key to fulfilment is Love,
Always to be borne in Heart.
You running and you running and you running away,
Sang Mr. Bob Marley
But you can’t run away from yourself.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije..
Everywhere I sought it
I sought in every land
To know if Nature’d wrought it
Anywhere beneath her hand
But though I searched with all my might
And though I looked forever
I’ve never seen before my sight
An ugly flower ever.
Sometimes it might seem to be
She‘s hidden and can‘t be seen
Through land or on the sea
As though she never hath been
Yet when ever a Flower blossoms
When a Flower blooms
Pure beauty is all I see in dozens
In all my heart’s rooms.
Did Heaven ever come to earth?
Did Beauty ever give birth?
Womanhood indeed is Heaven’s flower
Heaven’s beauty, Heaven’s grace and Heaven’s power.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
In seeking Contact with people
Seek that within them
Which is the core of their
Human essence.
There is a moment
Like an electric shock,
When humanity meets humanity
Your cores touch
And so do always your chores –
A kickstart into the Quick
Hearts run like rivers
Seeking the sea. Let it be.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
A road of water, slippery
A bridge of knife-edge, treacherous
A fall of repetition, weakening
An opacity of reflection, saddening
A backdoor of wall, illusionary
A tiger of library, jealous
A conscience of intuition, merciless
Hardfall on softpain, intangibles
Awakening twice, once to life and once to self
Accepting the conditions of the journey
Intangibles, contradictions, repetitions, unpredictables
Armed with Intuition and intellect
Go with the flow.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
A monster of a man
World on his shoulders
Yet fragile is his heart
Go easy on him
He will lift world records
With muscle-rippling ease
But a heavy heart, a broken heart
Will weigh him down
His ego is no bigger than yours
And when he cuddles his little baby
His arms are just as gentle
Trembling hands, subtle fingers
He was a weightlifter
Now he’s down, leaden of heart –
Who will be the one to
Stroke his head and gently lift him up?
He is light as a feather if you ease his pain
Easy like a Sunday morning
Will melt in your hands like butter
Fly with you to the midnight moon, effortlessly.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There is a poet
He lives in me
I am his host and his prisoner –
He is not married to my wife
He is not related to my family members
He does not come from my country
He does not work for my employer
He is a recluse
A hermit
Who lurks sometimes seen sometimes unseen
In the waters within my heart
I heard his name
They called him Spirit.
He looks at me
With his burning eyes
Only when he has something to say
Then, calling my name, he commands:
“Pen, write…”
And I write.
And that’s all I know about him.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
We’re walking on air
It’s a carpet of sometimes white
Sometimes grey and fair
Domed by azure blue and bright
Cushion of cloud.
Creation, I’m sure, is proud
Of its laws, perfect and very (extra) ordinary
Treasures for all who seek and invent
Awe-inspiring, comforting, scary
They make us small and silent.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Random quantum sugar
Sweet on my tongue
Fleetingly I savour your love
When it comes
Unexpectedly, like a suddenly remembered dream
You never knew you once dreamed
… when?
Random how it leaps
Madness joy how it keeps
My lonely heart, how it weeps
Tonight
Unhappy to have grown used to your
Absence.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
ONCE UPON a time, a man woke up and gazed upon a thought hanging in the air above his bed.
And the longer he looked at it, the more it confused him. And when he looked away, he forgot it.
Through the day it disturbed him, a memory he was trying to remember, but could not remember what he was trying to remember. But this he remembered: I am not who I think I am.
So this thought – I am not who I think I am – stayed with him for many hours, each as long as a decade, as he tried to fathom its meaning. Verily, it became his very name. His very aim.
Many hearts. In which one lies the answer? So he broke them open and left them behind, ravaged, the sought unfound.
He is written about in the books of men. His character has been copied and reproduced in stories down the ages – the raging, ravaging beast that consumes hearts and upturns nations. In truth he is a tireless seeker, and always giving. In shrouded truth. Love and peace cloaked in battle and tears. Shredding hearts to pieces with merciless thirst. How many times has he altered history, chasing the mirror? Thus has his troublesome picture been painted before him repeatedly. Thus too does he see himself, hours later.
But all I want is to find the key. Burning Flame, you are not who you THINK you are. This thought nags in him. Remember.
I am a warrior. No.
I am a lover. No.
You are a bridge. Just be.
Just be.
There! There it is again, the morning-thought, hanging once more in the sky above his mind. Hard to grasp:
Just be.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There is a graveyard thence
With benches placed all over
Where people come a-steady
To ponder life and death
There is a certain bench
Apart from every other
Where I sit when poetry
Takes clean away my breath.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 