Beautiful is the song of siring
In haunts of wanting
In gaunt bellies of starving need
My roots will ravish your burning greed
And then turn again, midnight
And accept the other side of the sun
Thrust out the other cheek
And if it hurts, let the pain make you weak
The weak will inherit the night
And the strong will be on their knees
Begging for more of yesterday
No to power, yes to play.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
You’ll never be a better man
Than the boy you once were
So, when you lose your way
The answer you seek is not far:
Remember the dream you once had
Between child- and adulthood
When the boy you once were
Had just awakened from his dream
And the man you now are
Had not yet forgotten that dream.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Those trees
Changing leaves
Changing their minds
Turning times
Redressing time
But there’s an hour when
Fear leaves
Turned red
Fall yellow, weak, finished, all said and dead.
Then you change your mind too
After the thoughts are fallen
Your fearlessness stands naked hard in the bolding cold
Do you fear your own freedom, your own self-dependence?
Are you afraid of your own courage?
November strips the brave of their cowardice
And the cowardly of their bravery.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Die Liebe meint es gut mit mir
Immer, wenn ich den Weg in mein Herz hinein verliere
Bricht sie mir offen eine neue Tür
Lieber Schmerz als Brennholz, bevor ich zu Tode erfriere
Und wenn ich drohe, aufzugeben
Erfüllt sie mich mit Sehnsucht nach Wiederdaheimesein
Und wenn es mir schwerfällt, zu vergeben
Weicht sie mir das steife Herz mit süßem Tränenwein.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Alles alles
Normales
Nominales
Alles halt
Mit schwarzen Streichelstreifen schuhsohlengeschmuste helle sanftbraune Stuhlbeine
Weich gesessene Ledersessel
Denn der Herbst schleicht da draußen um das Haus herum
Durch den Nebel
Tritt mir Lautlos entgegen
Ich übertöne es mit abstrakter Automusik
Die Reifen flüstern strassestrasse
Molltöne öffnen mir ein Seitenohr
Bahnstreik. Frühschicht. Mal wieder Autokuscheln mit Schal
Mal wieder gemeinsam reisen mit
Umrissen und Lautlos und Musik lau in Hinterstund –
Bis ich aus dem Nebel hervortrete
Alles normal. Guten Morgen, Herr Kollege.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Wait for the knocking of the carpenter
For it won’t be long
Lovingly building that cradle, soft of hay
It will be rocked by a virgin’s song
But a prouder man, a truer man
Will watch over the smile of a radiant star
– Then, lonely earth spirit, light up your heart
For Christmas is no longer far.
And if you think deeper, you will realise
He did not come to die, but to open up our eyes
To Life, to love, to a new reason to strive.
Breathe again, wilted human flowers – and rise…
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Raus rücken mit der Sprache
Ein Wort genügt; das Wort vergnügt
Genügt, um dich zu entlasten
Vergnügt jedoch auch dein Entlassen
Bitte. Nein, betteln wirst du nicht
Sie sollen selbst beunfriedigend entscheiden:
Du, lebend, leidend, stolz
Oder du, tot, beleidigend, stolz.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
There used to be a village quiet
One of many of the same childlike face
Faces of native fisherfolk
Of contentment in nature’s ancient cradle
A village on the river
Somewhere in the labyrinth of the Niger Delta
The songs they sang on their swaying boats
Put to sleep the fish in their nets’ embrace
Sweet was the voice of the water
Clear, her heart, clear, her mind
But, treacherous, the land bore a secret treasure
Deep within her precious heart
And they came, they came, thirsty
For the dark oily secret in her laps
And they drill, they drill, deeply, and spill
And until today they’re coming still
The village, it is no more
The river’s song is choked slowly to death
Crude and dark and slimy and viscous
The oil has smeared the water and defiled the land
But, unquenched, the flames of caustic lust
Still they burn, still they yearn
The bright acid fires that char our skin
Burn our throats too and poison deep our thoughts
Our colourful birds are burned into memory
Our fish, our beasts will be future-fossilized
There was a tree, it was the last of its kind
May nature preserve our footprints still formed
And the villagers now are refugees at home
Seeking other shores and other huts
Seeking rivers where they can again sing their songs
As they outcast their ancestral nets
And in their hearts they never forget
That once upon a not-so-distant time
They had a land, they had a river, that hid
A precious dark secret beneath its soft breast.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Egal, wo ich waten ging
War es immer dasselbe
Nil, Niger, Yangtze
Hudson, Thames, Elbe
Die Menschen treiben hin
Verschwommen und benommen
Lauschen reflektierend
Den eigenen Phantomen
Die gaukelnden Abbilder
Sie fesseln immer gleich
Im heim’schen und im fremden
Bodenlosen Teich
Dann rinnt jeder nach Hause
Aufgelöst zurück
Im Blutbahn kreisend Hoffnung
Auf Ruhe und auf Glück.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Arctic thirty
Arctic melting
The smell of oil
Well conflicting
A powerless crew
Against a powerful few
The wealth of the earth
Is in the human heart.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
