NICHTS EIGENTLICH

Warst Du schonmal in einem Gespräch
wo viele Worte benutzt wurden
und nichts gesagt wurde?

Warst Du schonmal in einer Umarmung
wo viele Küsse gegeben wurden
und nichts getauscht wurde?

Warst Du schonmal in einem Umzug
wo viele Meilen überquert wurden
und nirgendwo angekommen wurde?

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Im Jahrzehnt der deutschen Dichtung

WHEN I WAIT

When I wait, I wait for you
When I go, I go to you
When I stand, I stand with you
What are you?

When I live, I live in you
When I die, I die because of you
When I work, I work for you
Who are you?

When I remember, I remember you
When I dream, I dream of you
When I long, I long for you
When are you?

Why are you so present?
Why are you so absent?
Why are you so prescient?
Why are you?

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river

UNGESEHEN

Ich bin so sichtbar
Nie tauche ich auf ohne wahrgenommen
zu werden.

Ich bin so unsichtbar
Ich kann stundenlang tagelang wochenlang
monatelang jahrelang ja jahrzehntelang
unentdeckt mitten unter Freunden
und Familie und sogar Feinden
leben und lachen und lieben und schweigen
ohne nicht mal den Kontakt zu meiden.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains

NOBODY IS SOMEBODY

If I wasn’t a writer and a musician, I would not have a social media presence. I would be silent, invisible to the world, and nobody would know my thoughts or my feelings, nobody would know the peace deep within my heart, and the storms and wars that interrupt it every once in a while and then slide back again into the Peace. Only the people close to me and the people I meet at work would even know that I exist. And I would be so happy. Nobody would hear the silence in my heart. Because the best kind of somebody is nobody.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains

PEOPLE NEVER COME BACK

People never come back
They move on to the new you
Or to their new perception of you
With or without you
And you move on to the new them
Or to your new perception of them
With or without them
But the old will never come back.

Tomorrow will come.
Those who try to cling on to the past
Lose their way and orientation very fast
Because Time never goes back.
Those who meet again do so in the future
As different people with a different Nature
Because only going forward takes you back
Home.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river

ONE LOVE

You can only love one person, you can never love two people or even more. True love. In order to love another person, you have to first change and become a different person. But the person who loved that first person can never ever love another person. Once your heart has bonded, it can never ever unbond again, until it dies and becomes born again as a new heart.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains

ECHT SEIN

Es muss echt sein
und von Innen kommen
Egal ob bei Politik oder Wirtschaft
Bei der Arbeit und in der Gesellschaft
In der Familie, in der Nachbarschaft
In der Liebe und in der Freundschaft
Echtheit ist es, was die Ewigkeit schafft.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Im Jahrzehnt der deutschen Dichtung

SELF-RESTRAINT

Just because it’s available
Doesn’t mean you should take it;
Just because it’s achievable
Doesn’t mean you should make it;
Just because it’s vulnerable
Doesn’t mean you should break it;
Just because it’s uncomfortable
Doesn’t mean you should fake it;
Just because it’s unshakeable
Doesn’t mean you should shake it;
Just because it’s accessible
Doesn’t mean you should wake it;
Just because it’s expendable
Doesn’t mean you should stake it;
Just because it’s edible
Doesn’t mean you should bake it.

Some things you just leave as they are.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river

YOUR SELF-WORTH: AN ETERNAL AND PERPETUAL SUNRISE WITHIN YOU

Your self-worth does not depend on another person’s acceptance of you or love for you. It is your own personal fundamental imprint upon Creation, your contribution to the flowering of the universe, your service to God. It is the authenticity with which you do everything you do; it is the truthfulness you manifest in all your dealings; it is the joy you bear within you inspite of all the reversals and disappointments you may experience; it is your loyalty to goodness above all things; it is your claiming of your right to dare and to fail without being mocked; and it is your claiming of your right to succeed.

It is your humility when you boldly lead and your dignity when you faithfully follow; it is your free will; it is your ability to love yourself and to love others; it is your honesty to yourself when you have erred; it is self-correction and self-motivation; it is your sense of principles; it is the love you give back to those who love you; but it is also your freedom from the chains of those who love you; and yet it is also your duty of truthfulness and dignity to those with whom you share a bond of trust; it is your obligation to your promises and the way you stand up to them; it is the firmness with which you resist evil; it is the severity with which you tell yourself the truth after you have yielded to wrongness.

It is your sense of humanness, your consciousness of being someone; it is your fighting spirit, your refusal to die spiritually or emotionally; it is the eternal and perpetual Sunrise which you carry within you; it does not require another person to be sad in order for you to be happy; it does not require others to be a nobody in order for you to be a somebody; it is your sensing and seeking and going of your own path, without unjustly intruding on others’ paths and free will; it is all this and more. But it definitely does not depend on the love or acceptance you receive from anybody else. It stands by itself, an integral part of you. It is You.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains

DER LETZTE AUGEN-BLICK

Im aller letzten Augenblick
kommt immer wie geschickt
eine Wendung zum Pech oder Glück.

Der letzte Herzschlag
entlässt die Seele in sein wahres Geschick.
Die letzte Umarmung, das letzte Wort
tötet die Liebe oder holt sie zurück.

Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Im Jahrzehnt der deutschen Dichtung