A smile is a gift-wrapped heart
A heart is an unspoken smile
You grow on me
Windows open up too
A transparent pane of glass
I see you through
Houses head upward
But we speak one tongue
This time. We change hearts
Like we change lanes –
We grow on us.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Some wounds cannot heal
Don’t open them for they are
Like the clock that ticks only forward
How ever often the cycle closes
Yet the wound still bleeds
Because I saw into your mind
All the I’m sorrys in this world
Only make it worse
We met, it seems, just to miss.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
In the tears in his eyes I saw the question
What will happen to her
When I am gone?
There was a tenderness about the way
He looked at her, spoke to her
Touched her arm with every third word
And his eyes that looked into the distance
Were not gazing back at their past
Or wondering about his afterlife
They were looking into her future and marvelling
At the fact that life goes on
Even when you’re gone.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There is something about being different –
People can’t place their finger on it, can’t say why…
Some think it’s your colour
Some think it’s your hair
Some think it’s your religion, your culture, your upbringing and education –
Whence is the origin of that which is deeper than style?
Well, when God sunk me, a melody,
Into the soils of soul searching
He must have watered me with the laughter of your wellspring
Because you are my taste
When I feed upon His Word –
Ssshh, I say no more.
Blessed be he, that wandering bard,
Who in sweet swansong sighed and said:
“All I need in this life of sin
Is me and my girlfriend.”
I know what you mean, Tupac.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Hardly a night goes by
Hardly a breath flows, an evening
Melts
Without this thought
You brighten my life
Curly windows
When the crowds are many
I am alone
I wanted to be a nightingale
To be a flower
I wanted to be a star
The evening wind blows
I am human. Let it be…
Sometimes again
Freed from the city’s shackles
Hackles, hard tackles
I am green, bright yellow, blue as sky
Glad am I.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There is a slitherer
Snaking without fear
For he owns your urges
Like thirst owns the night
Like Guilt owns sight
Like frustrations delight owning
Like we argued about seeking distance
And about seeking closeness
And said I don’t fucking care
Just so we would not say
I love you, you are mine
Don’t sleep with him, don’t sleep with her, Baby.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Who knows
Better than the nose
How a thing really smells?
Who spies
Clearer than the eyes
Where a thing really dwells?
If your heart
Is your most tender part
Then I am a compass
And you are a chart.
I will always find you
Lovely lass
And encompass you.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There is in me a longing
For a place
A longing which no place on earth
Can satisfy
Because I long for Home –
There is in me a yearning
For a love
A yearning which no human love
Can satisfy
Because I yearn for the Light –
But, on the other side of
The mountain peak
There is a woman to whom my
Heart belongs…
But there she is, beyond my reach
Just a tear away –
But I do not know how to cry.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
A boy gave to a girl
A string of promises
Each vow was a pearl
And he strung eleven pearls together
On a silver cord
And presented them to her
As a parting gift…
But those who sow must reap.
She gave his string of pearls
To the man she really loved
And he gave it to the woman
He really loved
She gave it to the person
She really loved
Who gave it to the one
Most truly beloved
And so on and on
Until one day
The boy’s string of promises
Found its way
Back to him
Unbroken.
– C.he Chidi Chukwumerije
What is a kingdom to a God?
What is a moon to a sun?
What is thought to intuition?
What do you care?
Just dare!
When you are smashed
By your blasphemous Ambition
You will emerge
From out of the ruins of your kingdom
The shells of your broken personality…
Plant your mind
Like a budding tree
Into the deep dark soil of
Your intuition –
Let the Gardner sow
Let the Gardner tend
Let the Gardner reap.
That is why it took me so long
To realise we were always separating
Our love was always an ending
Never a commencing
A world is not enough for a home.
A grain of sand will do
When love is true.
O who would have known it was a love story
When our swords first clashed?
O who would have known it was a war
When our lips first met?
And Growth.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 