It is love.
You cannot
Mathematize it.
It will
Mesmerize
Scandalize
Legalize
Illegalize
And always leave Questions
Behind.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Of human beings
MORNING TIME IN THE HOUSE OF STRIVING
It’s such a beautiful morning
The warmth of the day
seems to come partly from me
and partly from the sun –
The light of day makes visible
what already I see
I see through myself too…
A bundle of hopes
A catacomb of dreams
A flaming forest of wishes
A stirring of longings
An understanding
of imperfection as unfailing as
the morning –
Morning time in the house of striving…
Hello to the world
Greetings to my neighbour
Good morning, Stranger
By the time night calls
you will see
that you and me
suffers one destiny.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
SLIPPERY
I have seen
That Evil
Is deep
It has silenced me
For where it nests
Is the noiseless depth
Pay no attention to my words
They are a distraction
If you want to hear my message
Listen to my silence
My words will show you the way into my silence
Where I talk of treachery no words can describe.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
UNITED
If love is like this all the time
Then love is magic; and love and time
Are one.
So let it keep rolling, flowing, growing
When it doth snow, let it keep snowing
Until it’s done.
Because underneath the melting snow blanket
A new beginning of our love forms, and bank on it
We’ll still be one
When it’s done.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
HAWKSHEAD
If Heart could speak on its own
Without Brain as translator
Spoke its Intuition alone
Unmindful of intellect, that imitator
What startling things, yet unknown
Would fill the world’s books?
What silent waters, from their deep zone
Would rise as bubbling brooks?
If there were Child in Adult
Awake, seeing, hearing, speaking
If adults would spare themselves the insult
Of hiding the child they in themselves are keeping
How different every day would feel
Refreshing, natural
With the adult balancing the child’s zeal
And the child making the adult more natural…
Youth, so important
Magic Time between two times
Child and adult merge concordant
Complementing each other like natural rhymes –
What you are in your youth is what you’ll be forever
Deep within your heart –
The heart speaks its mind but once, and never
Again from that path will depart.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije (Poems inspired by the Lake District)
THE THIRST COMMANDMENT
One man’s iconolater
Is the other man’s idolworshipper
Only the iconoclast
Is atheist – to some
Iconic deity itself to others
We see from different sides.
One man’s woman
Some nights is another
Woman’s man
– shout! all you want
Hidden things will continue
To happen in hidden places.
Understanding is
A fragment of that
Cracked mirror’s bottom.
Return from your space ship
Bewildered scientist
The greater mystery is humanity.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
HOLD MY HAND
I just feel hope in my heart
Because that’s all I have left.
So I hold on to hope, my wine
And I smile even though in my heart
I harbour a river of tears
Ships adrift in rudderless cry
And I can’t find the shore
So I’m drunk on hope
And I’m high on hope
Some call it illusion
Or even delusion
But we who have a vision
We call it hope
All we have, all we need, is hope.
And then in the morning
I wake up with a hangover
Looking for new hope. Hold my hand.
My ship is looking for land.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
(Image courtesy 857818/Pixabay)
MADIBA
Kindness was his rod
With it he parted the red sea
Kindness was his road
Wide enough for all of humanity
Step forth, step forth, step forth
West, East, South, North.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
UNYIELDING
Words never stopped anyone
Whose heart was a gun
He’s just out to kill someone
Night never scared anyone
Whose heart was a sun
He’s just out to bring a new dawn.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
SAVING THE HUMAN RACE
Another typhoon
Another tsunami
Another hurricane
Another earthquake
Another flood
Another fire
Another loss and pain and tragedy
Why am I still counting all this heartbreak?
We will all fall victim some day
To another natural accidental act of fate
It is our one united destiny upon this mysterious earth.
And then the wars and the migrations…
Some say they are human-made
But don’t blame only the countries involved
Many other people and governments secretly share the blame too.
We suffer as a continuum,
One humankind.
If these things don’t bring us together as one human race, then nothing will. Saving the human race is not just about saving lives. That is just the one half of it. The other is the anchor: It is about preserving the humanity in us when we let another’s suffering touch us and move us to help. We save two human beings. Them and us.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 