YOUR HONEY TONGUE

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I love you when you speak
The language of peoples gone;
Your mind, if you don’t mind, is antique;
Your honey tongue is on the run,
Breathlessly chasing a people’s dream
Gently up the stream.

You were my lover in hot dark nights
And you just couldn’t keep still;
Your tongue was restless as those kites
That circle and circle the forbidden hill,
And you taught me the language that lovers speak
When the spirit is willing and the flesh is weak.

Coo like a dove, my sweet love,
The sounds that you make are never enough.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

MANDELA, LEARNING FROM OTHERS’ MISTAKES: 1 – (Preamble)

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(Lessons from the first (mis)steps following modern Africa’s independence)

It sounds like a myth now. They say South Africa was on the brink of civil war after the release of Mandela and the collapse of apartheid. Civil war? Really? The Zulus and the Xhosas were heading for tribal war? And, simultaneously, the blacks against the whites in racial massacre? Well, it is true that it all sounds a bit far-fetched to some people now… because it did not happen. Because Mandela opted for reconciliation and spearheaded an intense drive to find a common basis for all to live, share power and face the future together. But, as far-fetched as all this may seem today, it was actually the most likely turn that events would have taken, based on the history of African so-called independence. This is a history that Mandela, and those who thought like him, knew all too well and, like wise people do, gravely feared. It is a history replete with the educative one-two punch of the strong heady wine of independence, liberation and freedom, eventually followed by the bad-tempered and moody hangover of disorientation, destabilisation and crisis.

Independence, all too often, is followed by civil strife and civil war. On all continents, in different eras, there abound records of great and small nations who have been unable to avoid this cliff in the arch of their history. When a nation-space has been oppressed or suppressed for a long time, it exhibits the properties of a socio-political pressure cooker. Once the lid of suppression is lifted, tumultuous explosions sooner or later follow as the various agendas and sensibilities of its component parts push to the fore, each demanding fulfilment. It requires strong-willed, knowing, conscious leadership to harness the liberated energies and channel them into constructive upbuilding. The opposite would mean a repetition of the same wild implosion into self-destruction witnessed after independence in many African countries, and as is happening right now in South Sudan. It is a pity that more than two decades after the fall of apartheid, Mandela’s example has not been understood and internalised by many other African peoples, personalities and groups still trying to find the most conducive forms of post-independent co-existence.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije

Continued in Part 2 of 11:
MANDELA, LEARNING FROM OTHERS’ MISTAKES: 2 – (Egypt’s modern pharaohs)

UNQUIET STORM

~ Che ~ 1 Comment

Often, upon many an unquiet storm
Seeking calm exits through rough unfriendly seas
I have longed for death, and then
Quickly corrected myself, for even then,
Deep within, I sensed
That death would be no end.

And I have given kindness, even though
I knew that kindness would be a signal
To those who sail the dark waters
To come in and take advantage of me.
And I have kept many a dark secret silently inside
Just to protect some people, that they be not exposed.

And I have kept my peace
So that others may have their piece
And when they did not turn around
To say thank you, I have continued
To be that way still
For I know no other way to be.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

HIGH PRICE

~ Che ~ 2 Comments

Is the price
Of life
Too high?
Experiences that break you
And rob you of the desire
To carry on living.

Is the price
Of knowledge
Too high?
Experiences that teach you things
Which in the end you wish
You never came to know.

If the price
Is this high
Then the prize
Had better be worth it
What ever it may be.

Some say it’s eternal life
Some say it’s finding yourself
But what do they know?
All these wiseacres
Just as lost as you are.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

CAPTIVATION

~ Che ~ 3 Comments

I used to call you petal
Each time I pulled your lobes
And read your thoughts
Discreetly from far away in my personality
The way the farmer reads the clouds
Early in the morning

And thus you told me, without words
When to sow and when to reap
When to prune and when to weed
And when to wait with the patience
Of a farmer waiting for the harvest
Of his labour of love…

Those were the months you thought I was cruel
For the mystery of mirrors is this
The mirror cannot show you what’s
At the back of your mind. Only your lover can
When he breaks your heart
In order to get into it and conquer it

And thus did I imprison myself
For the conundrum of conquests is this
The king is the captive of his own kingdom
And when you let me break your heart
Little did I realise that you did it
Just to make sure you got me in

I came in for the kill
And never made it out again.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

LOVE NOTE

~ Che ~ 4 Comments

You are not yonder desert
That cried a wailing note
In the history books of strangers

Oh no! Nor a lost ocean
Shedding tears on every shore
Its aching fingers can reach, oh no!

I say what you hear, yes
Believe what you hear me say to you
You are not lost in translation

Did your lips taste the flesh of my teeth
Or your tongue flower with grace?
I see your ears smiling

Now, lie still and let the seeds of prophecy
Germinate and take root, roots
That grip your earth, yearning with fruit

I did it twice for a reason
The first time to make you feel at home
The second time to set you free again.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

TWICE IS NOT ENOUGH – pt. 4

~ Che ~ 7 Comments

But it was the third one that she particularly liked, and she read it a second time: The Touch

Something different, something true,
Otherly, something new
Very small, something extra large,
Quietly in charge
Inside you
It is what you really are in your soul
You
Your start and your goal
Path, quest, your role
And it is, simply, you.

Someone touched her on her shoulder as she was thoughtfully reading that poem a third time. She turned around to see a young, very dark complexioned woman of about her own age peering questioningly into her face.

“Yes?” she asked, somewhat irritated.

“Sorry, I thought you were someone else. I’m sorry.”

Ada relaxed and smiled at her, then turned back to the poems. But then she was tapped again on the shoulder.

Quizzically she turned her head round again, a slightly confused, even more irritated look on her face.

“Yes??”

The young woman hesitated again, then said:

“You look too much like someone I know –”

“I don’t know you –”

“Yes, no, yes I know. Actually, to be frank, this person is a man.”

“A man?”

“Yes.”

“As you can see, I am a woman!”

“Please, don’t be offended … but … is your name Ada?”

Ada’s eyes focused sharply on the stranger. Her diction was clear and proper, she looked refined and was somewhat pretty, if not beautiful, with a small but african nose, a broad face and large, perceptive eyes. Her skin had that intense darkness that Blacks like to call ‘black beauty’.

“I beg your pardon – How did? -”

“See, I have a friend called Tony whom you resemble to a high degree and he once told me that he has a twin sister called Ada. So I was just wondering… if…”

Ada softened; and realised that everybody around them was paying close attention to their conversation; thus, simultaneously, she became self-conscious and shy. – of course!, Tony! Where was her mind! – such thoughts too raced immediately through her mind., reflected in her eyes, those treacherous windows of hers.

“You know Tony?” she asked in a lowered, nicer voice.

The young woman’s face suddenly lit up and she looked almost like a child. Radiant, naïve, open. Pure.

“Yes!” She struggled to keep her voice down. “My name is Ngozi. I knew him, er, in the university.”

“I see,” said Ada, feeling abruptly very uncomfortable. “Well, nice meeting you, Ngozi.” She turned.

Ngozi, confused, raised her hand to tap Ada’s shoulder a third time, hesitated, and then dropped it once more. Now she became aware also, for the first time, of the attention being paid her. She swept her eyes around and faces turned quickly away, conversations were struck up here and there, while a few understanding eyes surreptitiously melted friendly glances her way, then were gone too, and she was alone again…

Ada, in the seat in front, bent her head meanwhile into the sheets of paper in her hand, on the shopping bag on her lap, and, over and under, through and with the shudderings and other misadventures of the Molue, resolutely went into the assimilating of the fourth of the six poems – earthy moments…

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

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BELOHNUNG

~ Che ~ Leave a comment

Es war schön, weil
Es ein Ende hatte –
Immer, wenn es mir schlecht
Geht, geht es mir
Am Besten. Das vergesse
Ich jedes Mal, bis der Schmerz
Die Tür der inneren Freude wieder
Auf reißt.

Ich habe alles verloren
Was ich einst besaß
Und das ist das
Was ich jetzt besitze.

Meine besten Freunde werden nie
Den Weg zu mir finden.
Meine tiefsten Schmerzen werden nie
Die passenden Worte finden.
Ich werde nochmals alles verlieren
Und das wird mein Geschenk sein
An Euch.

Die Dichtung lässt sich nicht gut verkaufen
Und doch rettet sie Seelen. Wo ist die Gerechtigkeit?
Wo ist der Ausgleich für den Dichter?
Es lohnt sich nicht, ein Gedicht zu schreiben
Du verblutest nur am Straßenrand
Die Welt spaziert einkaufend an Dir vorbei.
Selbst ist der Lohn.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

SELF-BELIEF

~ Che ~ 4 Comments

“Keep chipping away at that block
Keep clipping away at that rock
Keep knocking on and breaking that stone
Keep striking at and cracking that bone
It is their faith, their pride, their hope and strength
It is the very foundation of their self-confidence
So just keep hammering steadily away at it until
They lose every belief in themselves and their will.”

Now if you’re reading this and know what I mean,
Stand up and holler at your foes seen and unseen:
“I can’t be beaten! I can’t be stopped! Because I’ve seen through you
And I’ve seen through me, and I’m the stronger of the two!

Break me down and I’ll come back twice as strong
You don’t know my foundation, so you can’t kill my song.”

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.

UPON MY WORD

~ Che ~ 2 Comments

The pen is mightier
Than the sword
If only writers knew
The meaning of this word
Going forward, going backward

Those who seek vengeance
Through the use of the pen
Are writing their own sentence
Regret won’t heal the pain

Regret won’t heal the pain
My friend
So tread lightly in the rain
And softly sing

And softly sing
For when the verse is over
You’ll be the one to compose again
A new chorus to start over

And when you live again
Your life will be a book of stories
And everything you wrote
Will line your path with pain
Or shame or gladness or glory.

Some kill themselves by the sword
But most commit suicide by their own word.
Some live by the sword,
SOme die by the word
And vice versa.

– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.