How humility can guide you To find yourself if you let it - How anger can ride you To death if you won’t forget it - Forget it, it’s done and gone, Your pain is the healing kind - When you lost her, you won A deeper heart, a higher mind. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
Of Self
A MAN
As a man, what makes you a man is your dignity – not your wealth, not your standing, not your position or power, not your achievements, not your intelligence, not your talents, not your handsomeness, not your “effect” on people. Only your dignity.
It is your courage to be honest to the world about who you are – because you know who you are. And it is the courage to be honest to yourself about who you should be – because deep down in your soul you also know who you should be.
And who you should be is the man you really are. Your noblest and most ideal self. A man.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains
SMILE
Did you know that Smiling makes you happy When you’re feeling crappy? Did you know that? I bet you’re smiling now. And if you were feeling crappy, Now you’re feeling a little happy - I bet you’re smiling now. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
PRE-DAWN
The light is gone from my heart And gone from my life And cut out my most sensitive part With a dark burning knife But I don’t care, because underneath The heavy mountain of pain A greater flame bursts from its sheath And lights up my heart again. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
SUDDEN JOLTS
I cry spontaneous tears
They come unbidden
Rolling back adult years
All of a sudden
The wounds, the tears
A shuddering bolt
And a painful spasm
Of old fears and new cares
That repeatedly scars
Anew my heart with a volt
Of shivering behind cold
Iron intangible bars
A body-wracking jolt
And then the next moment
I quietly laugh again
Grateful and content
To reap my fruits in pain
I don’t know when
The tears will come again
At 2 o’clock or at 10
In a meeting, at a game, or on a plane
Or taking a walk in the friend zone
Or sitting at home all alone.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river
REAFFIRMING DIGNITY
When a woman leaves a man who loves her to follow a man of money, it is the most crushing pain a man can feel. But if he does not let it kill him, it will only liberate him in the end. Every once in a while you have a chance to look at yourself in the mirror and tell yourself “I am somebody”. Something will push you there. Something that seems aimed at robbing you of your dignity, your pride, your self-respect. Something that will try to tie your actual value as a human being to some material status or achievement or level of acceptance by someone or some people. Something that will make you feel small. And nothing does this deeper than love that chooses money over you. Then you have to stand in front of the mirror and look into the soul of that man staring back at you and recognise his true value. Remind yourself of the principles at the core of your foundations as a Human Being. Remind yourself of what connects you to God and to true life. And teach yourself again that your value is more than your monetary wealth or material standing. And don’t allow anyone to tell you otherwise – not any man and not any woman. Because, In Your Dignity, You Are Somebody.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains
ORIENTATION
Don’t get used to the exhilaration, It is a bubble that will soon burst To be followed by the long deprivation And the unbroken thirst. Get used to the soberness instead, It will stay for longer than you hope And will be your daily bread With which you have to daily cope. I try not to yearn for the happiness, But the heart is treacherous; Unbidden it feels a new tenderness - This happens to all of us. And there are some pains you prepare for - They will always come, come back to you, For once upon a time it was you who tore It out of your heart and gave it a job to do. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
THE HEART’S INDEPENDNECE
Your Heart is an independent being, Don’t mess with it or it will show you pepper. All the wahala you think you’ve been seeing Will be yam when it shows you real shege. It will riot and refuse to obey you; It will sing praise songs to your enemies; It will believe things that are not true And long for its own self-decided remedies. It will turn into a wild unpredictable stranger With its own rules and on its own mission; It will rush forward and fear no danger, Driven by its own incomprehensible Vision. And when it hurts it will burn like hellfire; And when it laughs, you feel you’re in paradise; And when it loves it loves with fierce desire; But if it dies, your urge to live also dies. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
FIGHT FOR IT
You have to fight to be free - True freedom, inner freedom - Fight your fears and anxiety, The chains of your inner fiefdom; Fight your propensity and proclivity For weakening pleasure ; Fight your despondency And fight your insecurity With courageous Hope in equal measure. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
GOOD FOR THE SAKE OF YOU
When you do the right thing, you’re doing it for yourself. Always remember that. And let that be your motivation, your reward and your joy. Because you have to live with yourself always, and there is nothing worse than living with someone you don’t respect, someone you don’t trust, someone you don’t like and someone who is not in sync with you. And that person is yourself.
You are your own home, your own paradise or hell, and your own purgatory too in whom you have to recognise, discipline, purify and transform yourself. You are all you have. Handle yourself with care and with thought, with integrity. Any lesson you would like to teach your children one day, or wish you taught your children once upon a time, teach that lesson to yourself today. Lessons of character. Regard yourself as your first and last and only true child. If that child dies, you die.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 