Music made me
A bird saved me
A smile undid me
A woman slew me
A friend betrayed me
And I dug myself out of the Grave.
A wound bled me
A sword healed me
A dream baffled me
A heart became me… became I…
A Call reached me
Here, there and everywhere –
Now, tell me
If you understand humanity yet?
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
It is not a joke;
But everyone is laughing
As though it were…
Early in the morning
I can hear voices whispering
Before dawn…
But when I peered out through the window
I saw nothing
Yet heard something
Which sounded like whispering voices
Talking to me
Telling me what to write
And I write without complaint
Even though the pain is sometimes astronomical –
Yet I write.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
I won’t forget
Every thought I met
Blowing in the breeze
Resting beneath the trees
And mirrored on each lake
Asleep or awake
Before which we waited
And silently contemplated
Another wonderful day
Of this lovely holiday…
Thoughts that grow
Like flowers in the meadow
And time after time
Like a recurrent rhyme
Will yield new fruit
And like a Magic flute
Even as I age
Page after page
Will always light the light
Of Insight.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije. (Poems Inspired By The Lake District)
How do you stop loving someone? How do you forget her eyes and her face and her secret smile and the unwordable look she bears upon her countenance?
How do you stop loving someone? How do you forget the times shared? How do you forget the Love, the eternalness of your togetherness? How do you make it right forever?
How do you stop loving someone? How do you uproot love from your soul? A love that wants to remain. Someone who loves you so. A union that begs for fulfilment. How do you not continue an ancient story in a modern world? How does an old tune not give birth to a new tale? How does a stream die?? It just resurfaces in other places…
How do birds of one wing not visit heaven together? How does loneliness not seek itself? How does fire not burn? How do sowed seeds not grow? How can you restrain the moving sun, unless you first stop the rotation of the earth…? But then how so many other people die, how many other things are lost?
How do waterfalls desist from falling? Two elephants in one heart, two hearts in one elephant. If you kill the elephant and open the heart in order to understand this phenomenon, what if they all die, elephants and hearts?
How do you stop loving someone? I don’t know.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
In heaven
I saw birds
Even blackbirds
So I wrote
This poem
Which is just words
And when I was done
And looked up
It was an empty sky.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
My blood is blue river today
Every thought of you beknights me
Makes me feel like royalty
For thou art my queen…
If I strode across mountains
They would prostrate before my will
Proud to be footstool
To the queen’s lover
Naughty me
What a delicious secret
I feel like King Aka the Thirst
For I secretly drink from the queen’s fountains
My blood is blue river today
When it runs into you
You sigh…
At night I am thine king.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
When birds touch heaven
All we hear is
Music
And the music
Melts away the frozen tears
In my eyes
And my heart aches for you
But what is done is gone
Heaven and bird and wishing star
Where are you?
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
When it’s raining
Even if it’s raining pain
Put a bucket out and drink up
It might never rain again –
When it rained
Some weeks ago
A glorious thunder, a waterfall from heaven
I envied the child I once was
Who ran naked in the rain…
Come run with me, my heart called to me
In the rain I stood, adult but child again
And raised my hands, even though memory caused me pain
And took again a shower in the rain
Whilst my eyes rained tears unto my thongue
I remembered the land of childhood, where I belong
An unforgotten song.
Drink while it’s raining
Swim while it’s flowing
Cry while it’s hurting
It might never rain again –
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
When the rock was walking stoically
Through the mountain of time I was
On its back, and thought the ground was still
Beneath my running legs –
Restless was my heart
For I felt yours beating in it
And mighty were the loud congas
Drumming out my thoughts.
Yet there is one quiet thought
Too deep to be breached
Too quiet to be heard
By any but me.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
I am another blackbird
I want to fly high up in the sky
Shy and bold
Freed and loved
Here and there and
Everywhere.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 