Love is all
Something else
Is something less
Love all
Love less
Is loveless
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
(Image by Hans)
Of Virtues
LOVE FOREVER
To know the heart of things,
Like a boy, like a youth, would…
To perceive the Voice that brings
The Clarity that it could
And indeed always does,
That we may understand our flaws…
When did I forget how to read
The truth behind people’s facades?
When did my heart cease to bleed
On behalf of my neighbours’ bad fads?
And why do I even write at all?
What do I gain? Do I rise or fall?
I walk alone upon this earth
And expect nothing other than this…
I awake each day like it’s new birth
And through the day I learn it is…
And why I continue is the fact
That that posterity will love this Act
With which I hereby seal this pact.
Just love, and look back never –
We who love shall live forever.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
GRACE
If you are poor
Gracefully
Wear your poverty
If you are rich
Gracefully
Bear your prosperity
If you have nothing
But this small thing
– Grace –
You will never lose face.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
MIRAGES
So they faced me
If I was half a man, I would face them back
Good thing I was full man, not half
Or I would have fallen for the illusion
That you have to fight to be a man
So they turned away
If I had a little sense, I would beg for mercy
Good thing I had much sense, not a little
Or I would have fallen for the delusion
That you have to join the crowd to have a face
So they attacked the strangers
If I loved my kind, I would join in the attack
Good thing I loved humankind, not just my kind
Or I would have fallen for the mirage
That you have to hate strangers to love your own
The world is full of cynics
Who on earth still believes anything good?
Raise your hand in the air
And wave it like you just don’t care
If you really don’t care
There are many ways to fall asleep
Many ways to hide away
Many ways to deceive yourself into believing
Your mask is better than your face
Is better than yourself.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
SUBTLE TIES
He was my best friend
Yet when we parted
None gave news to the other
Of the path he charted
Where one went high
The other went low
And where one learned to lead
The other learned to follow.
She was a wild flower
But deep in her soul
She was a gentle morning
That made people whole
She fell in love with one
Then met the other
And fell for him too
Like he was her lover
Torn between a leader
And a follower
She learned with surprise that the higher
Is indistinguishable from the lower
The hunter is the hunted
The writer is the reader
The leader and the follower
Are both follower and leader.
He was my best friend
And though we walked separate ways
Destiny brought us together
Back to the same place.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
THE RIVER
Time could be a river
If I were standing still
Or a dream, if I
Had taken a sleeping pill –
But awake I meander
Through dreams which I fulfil
So I must be the river
And time is standing still.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
BEHIND THE CURTAIN
What would the sky give
To uncage the clouds and set the rain free?
Everything she has; and yet
What’s the use?
You can set old secrets free
New ones will pile up inside again
For only what is hidden can set us free.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
This Poem was inspired by the Article: CONFESSIONS.
PASSING LOOK
A blind man walked into the busy tram
His cane tapped audibly on the wall
Of many a closed mind –
There was an unsteady way he shuffled about
Stumbled, and then clutched the railing
Without letting go of his staff, still swaying
In his other hand three polyethylene bags
Full of his grocery – I tried but
Could not read the look on his calm face.
I hate it when the conversations die,
He must be thinking, I’m thinking
As the whole tram stared at him
But he could not stare back.
Two stops later, he gingerly tapped his way
Out of the tram, his face calm, illegible.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
DIRT
My hands are clean when
I rub them in the dirt
Washed in the tears of the homeless
Warmed by the laughter of the dignity
Of the downtrodden
Did they lose it all
Just to gain this clarity in their eyes?
Don’t lie to a person
Who has seen through all of society’s lies
They can unmask every government
They can unmask every family
They can unmask every act of friendliness
They know the difference between kindness
And charity. They can unmask you
And they can unmask me.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
THE INNER ROSE
Beware of those
Who like the wind does
To the petals of the rose
Like the mind blows
The poetry out of the prose
– Those who sense
The source of your strength
And work only to dent
And take away your self-confidence.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 