Poems

MISSING

~ Che ~ 6 Comments

Where are you?
The police have looked high and low
Community watch and kind strangers near and far
Have tried your trail to follow

The orange tree we planted
Yields season after season bitter bitter fruits
That would turn sweet were you but here
To pick them off their roots

The children you lovingly bore
Daily older grow, as beautiful as you were
They ask where their mother is
Unable to comprehend how people disappear

I wish we hadn’t gone on that holiday
I wish you hadn’t taken that stroll
That night alone to watch the waves
The ensuing years have taken their toll

My thoughts spank of guilt
I should have been your guard on every walk
What happened, my love? Footsteps don’t talk
Time is a blackboard of fading chalk

Give me a sign of life
Calm my heart, let us know
You’re happy, even in the beyond somewhere
Saying goodbye, I love you in my soul

Strength is a luxury
But succour shall whisper quietly some day
All good things come together in their own day
In their own way, this I pray.

Waiting and waiting in vain
For you to return, to talk, share and to listen
Where are you, my dear? Your picture is silent
Written above it, that killing word, still: MISSING.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

BUTTERFLY: BREAKING OUT OF A BROKEN HEART

~ Che

It takes a long time
To forgive yourself
For not giving love back
To the person that gave it to you –

Nobody can break your heart
Only you can break your own heart
Nobody’s forgiveness can set you completely free
Until you yourself have broken out
Of your broken heart,

Like Butterly.

 – Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

REFLECTIONS ON TRANSITION

~ Che ~ 5 Comments

The earth is the mother
And the physical body the womb
In which the soul incubates and grows
Before birth into the beyond.

Each time we on earth are born
We have but been sunk
As a seed into a surrogate mother’s womb
To grow there a little strong.

Death is but the midwife
Dying the throes of labour and pain
Someone misses you each time you are born
Something receives you back at death again.

And all the things you did on earth
Shall be as a dream in the womb
So heed your spirit even while in the flesh
For it alone remembers its home.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

A CERTAIN NEWNESS

~ Che ~ 1 Comment

New thoughts arising in colours becoming
New paths all over, all over my path
New answers falling in patterns benumbing
New friends with old faces
New ties with old places
New visions bring a new sense of belonging
Newness and calmness out from a new bath

Of old traits are few traces
Of new veins are full vases.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

BONDING

~ Che ~ 3 Comments

You know those walks we took
Down untarred streets and red
And brown was sand and book by book
We discussed all we’d read

You know those suns that set
As quietly we’d gaze
With hearts that knew to not forget
The orange tempered rays

You know those thoughts we thought
And knew not their origin
Yet marvelled side by side at what
Hearts bonded could be given

Nations will rise and fall
Sages will come and go
But Friendship will outlast them all
Through you, this I now know.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

PRISONERS OF LAW, CITIZENS OF LOVE

~ Che ~ 1 Comment

Sunday morning
The homeless beggar throws his plastic sheet off his destitute form
Steps out for a moment from under his bridge
Takes a dry bath in the warm sun’s rays

The off-duty policeman
Who tomorrow on duty will evict him again from under the bridge
Walks past him on his way to worship
Throws him a kind smile and a coin into his bowl.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

SOFTLY’S SONG

~ Che ~ 7 Comments

Seven times we spoke out our love
And it was done
Readily we tread where doves still rove
Steadily we dance on into the grove
Within the sun, upon
The vow of a million and one words unspoken
Veiling the secret that dreams on unwoken
Tomorrow our love-vow shall reappear, unbroken,
And we shall be one.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

EYES ON THE BALL

~ Che ~ 4 Comments

Up the road a few trees beckon
A moment of shade on a hot sunny day
If I stop and seek here refuge
I’ll miss my appointment at the end of my way
For my path is not my goal.

No thing of beauty will hold me down
No period of quiet will slow me down
No place of peace will hold me back
No woman, no wine, no work, no glory will change my story
For the path is not the goal, no matter what they say.

– che chidi chukwumerije.

IT TAKES TIME TO BE FREE

~ Che ~ 12 Comments

After I had rid myself
Of my father’s voice in my head
And my mother’s voice in my heart
And society’s voice in my ears
And fear’s voice in my throat
I stopped on a quiet morning
And listened to the sound of

My own voice
My own thoughts
My own intuition
My own will
My own way of seeing myself and seeing the world
And oh! How different it was
From what I had once thought was me.

Dazed in this silence
I looked and looked at me and me
Getting used to the sight … and feel… of me I
For it’s new when the mirror becomes an open window
Now I know why liberated birds hesitate before flying away
And why they take a while to get their bearing
And why they never return once they feel at home again in the wild.

– che chidi chukwumerije.

THE REAL STRUGGLE

~ Che ~ 4 Comments

Some doubt
That politics will not close
The cracks in society
That medicine will not heal
The bleeding soul
That intellect cannot remind
Intuition of Paradise

So they spend their lives
Listening to their head
And ignoring their heart –
They grow the mind
Then leave it behind
When they depart, listening for
An inner voice grown uneasily silent.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.