Shades of morning
Mantles of night ascending
Ghosts, like fears of the past,
Lay down softly to sleep at last.
Fear. Will whisper.
A thousand reasons to be a coward.
Until your inner man comes calling
The ground is so close
How come you’re still falling?
Beauty, soft kiss of dawn
Quietens you for a moment of tenderness
Before you shed your final skin
Of fear and pain
And stand up, never to crawl again.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There will be brief sudden moments
Of big aching dreams, they will
Tear you out of darkest despair
Remind you of the throbbing urge
That is your second heart.
An unexpected warm sunny day in winter
That seems to say: Shivering spark, I am
Summer’s promise sent ahead of time
An emissary of hope, here to remind
You to keep the faith.
Strengthened by quietness
You face the dark, and you laugh
And you say: Deep, you are my cocoon
The womb of midnight wonder, from which
I shall emerge, your secret butterfly.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
A gentle feeling of lullaby
A soothing wave, a beast asleep
A little child is passing by
Why does it weep?
Tears as large as sun and moon
Bright as heart, dark as dream
Butterfly trapped in a cocoon
Life is vanishing cream
We spend our youth growing old
Learning sophistication, hardening up
The night grows empty, proud and cold
Saddening up.
But precious moments will come sometimes
A tear, a thought, a child’s pure heart
A Memory, a bell that suddenly chimes
And tears your heart apart
Those who find the child again
Do so because they looked again
Through clouds of lies and inner pain
And wiped its tears of pain
And became normal again.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Don’t allow them to reduce you
To the picture they have of you
In the picture they have of themselves
Be proud of who you are
What you are, how you are
It is what the world needs
Stay. In your element, stay.
Be proud of who you are
But define it for yourself by yourself
Don’t be the canvas on whose back
They paint and admire themselves
And cover you up in the voiceless dark.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Let us be a little quiet
For the night is quiet
And still are our thoughts
That hurry on ahead of us
And in the quietness, let us
Reach each into the other
Let us for one moment be
Each a visitor within the other
Let us touch the fundamental thought
Something that is valid
On every plane, in every world
On every earth, in every Beyond
Something that is true in life
And true in death, true in hell
And true in heaven – the one thing
That is always true, everywhere.
The essence of our humanity
The substance of our spirit
The kingdom within, joy, gratitude
Simplicity, honesty, love. Especially, love.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
I love you Baby
But sometimes Love
Is not enough to make Lohengrin stay.
Don’t knock on the door
Of the Unknown, if you don’t
Want to be overtaken by the Unknown.
But if you must, you must
Even when the line you have crossed
Is the boundary of trust.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
He threw all the standard colourful
Discriminatory bigot remarks and innuendo
At me, then stepped back with a smirk
And waited to see it shame and hurt me
I knew this one had run out of arguments
And was fishing for the killer-blow
So I let it pass by without contact or impact
And leaned back and watched it confuse and hurt him
Some lines of attack grow old and stale
But some people just don’t get it
I speak back when speaking back will hurt you
And I ignore it when ignoring it will hurt you
Once upon a time, a man was humiliated
With fear and the theft of his dignity
But before he died, he whispered to me – You
Are my victory. Let my history be a lesson to you
Never go down without a fight. Never beg
For mercy when the killer points his gun
If they’re fair to you, be fair to them
But if they hurt you unprovoked – always always always
Somewhere
Someday
Somehow
Hurt them back.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Your brother in the ghetto
Is still your brother –
He might not have attended
The same type of schools as you did
He might not have acquired
The same kind of polish as you did
He might not even know
That you’re not as different from him
As he thinks
He might think
What you think: you’ve become strangers
No. He is still your brother
And when a bullet comes in the dark
It can’t tell the difference between you and you.
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
They can’t read
But they can read
The signs on the wall
They can read between the lines
When the educated are talking
They can read your thoughts
In your eyes
When you’re lying to them
They just don’t have the words
To explain that all they need
Is a seed of true knowledge planted
Into their minds when they were young.
Someone has to walk ahead
When others are looking
For someone to follow.
How many generations will fall like
Autumn leaves, wasted beauty?
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
Kidnapped
Is there still hope for me?
The sun sets sadly as slowly as he can
By the last light of day
Find my way
Did you see the baby that was stolen?
Did you see the boy that was broken?
However hard you look, you will see
No resemblance at all between them and
The man now woken, now walking.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 