If we could see ourselves through Other people’s eyes, how much better We would know ourselves and them too. In the cold your gaze is a warm sweater And when I’m lonely and missing you Your eyes write me a wordless love letter. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
Poems
BE RIGHT DO RIGHT
It‘s character that gets to heaven, not knowledge. Knowledge might know the way there even, but only character can attain the height of being, by doing, not just by knowing. Be right, do right, lets there be light. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
YOU CAN’T LEAVE YET
I ran left in a short vivid dream When I was climbing up the flight of stairs It was a flight of wide white marble stairs Or so it did seem But when I got to the top and turned back Behind me was a steep drop And a collapsed garden green from top To bottom and no way back. I found myself in the backyard of strangers So I jumped over the cactus hedge Onto the dusty brown street’s edge There to hurry towards new dangers Knocking on the locked red gate Where a hurt soul had declared war On the community I don’t know what for But to escape is now too late. Is it a dream or is it a mix-up? I haven’t even told you how this one began But the staircase disappeared and a man Said you can’t leave yet and I woke up. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
MAKING SENSE
Some things don’t seem to make sense And yet they’re right. You just feel it inside. The intuition accompanies common sense And makes it make sense from another side. Life when seen through the heart’s full lens Will reveal contexts that otherwise hide; To a closed mind they appear like nonsense But one day through facts they’ll be verified. Some things that seemed to be an offence Are an offence only to the rigidified; Some that seemed real become pretence When eventually exposed by time and tide. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
WORSHIP
When I’m down You give me strength Atheists say You don’t exist But You lift me up when I’m depressed And calm me down and give me rest How can I express my gratitude? Nothing I am or give or do Can come close to repaying You For being so faithfully kind and merciful Your Kindness is my sole inspiration Your goodness os deserving of imitation Your fidelity to rightness is a lesson In integrity, severity mixed with compassion People seek You in prayers and dogmas In churches, mosques, temples and likewise I seek You in Kindness and in Goodness In Bravery, in Purity, in Humility, always. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
AGAIN AND AGAIN
The Heart does not forget overnight Sometimes it needs more than one lifetime To forget the way back to the Light And the echo of the last Grail Bell’s chime Again and again it reads the Message Again and again it feels the pull of the Call But the gains and pains of the Modern Age Make it time and again slowly forget it All. A sad day it is time and time again When a soul rises again from its deathbed, And all it’s relatives’ tears and pain Will be nothing compared to its own regret. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
UNCONTROLLABLE LOVE
If you can control love Then you’ve never felt love Love is stronger than the human spirit The transformation of the soul, love did it Love will waylay you and disobey you Love will take you and make you and break you and remake you in its own image. And knows better than you What it wants to go with you Presage. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
GOLD’S LOW STANDARDS
Who decided that gold is the standard? Why do we think it is so valuable? A shiny metal. Can we eat it? Yet we bombard Humankind with unkind mined metal unable To nourish spirit or body or soul or even mind - But greed needs a rampart for greed is blind And money is the mockery of the honest grind. Silver and gold have brought sorrow untold To the timid and the bold, the young and the old, Warm-blooded and cold-hearted who all departed Without a dust of gold from the path they started Upon, seeking value in materialism’s charms And losing their value in materialism’s arms’ Creeping stranglehold that grins and harms. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
CHANCES ARE
To me it’s neither a window nor a door This thing called opportunity It’s a cloud, a bubble, foam on the shore Of nature’s recurring serendipity You will get chances to rise And you will get chances to fall Which one of these two you utilise Well, that is your call. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
NO OTHERS
I stopped wanting others After I met you - And I still don’t want any others Even after I’ve lost you. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 