What a difference a year can make Depending on the path you take The pillars you shake The bonds you break The demons or the angels you wake And the thirsts you slake. For whose or for what’s sake? For something real or for something fake? Some say the heart is a lake Beneath its surface there swims a snake Your happiness is at stake And yet all you seem to do is ache and ache. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
growth
THE EARTH SCHOOL
There are some people Who just don’t deserve good people, Yet good people will be meet them Because they’re a part of the system; There’s nothing you can do about that. As long as you walk this earth, You deserve every experience you get; You signed up for it before birth And now you have to run the gauntlet - There’s nothing you can do about that. Welcome to the school of maturing, Of pain, temptation, of debt incurring - But you CAN conquer after long enduring. Now I don’t know if you find this reassuring, But there’s nothing you can do about that. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
A LITTLE HAPPY EVERYDAY
Sometimes you love someone, but the person loves someone else. Or the person simply prefers a lifestyle different from the one which a life with you would have to offer them. So they choose or go after someone else who, or another path that, can offer them that lifestyle.
Being that the aim, the very aim, of life itself is Happiness, this experience of rejection cuts to the very heart of the essence of existence. The hurt can kill the soul. It makes people reappraise themselves, question their worth and even find fault in their own fundamental character. Yet, while self-examination is healthy, so also are self-love, self-understanding and self-acceptance equally necessary.
When trapped in a spiral of self-abnegation in which one no longer recognises oneself, It then becomes imperative to awaken, within one’s consciousness, a new narrative of life and of self in order to find the path to a new source of joy, as a new person. To outgrow the self-image that traps one in a cycle of pain, perhaps even to shed certain traits, and to learn to see oneself, one’s path and one’s Why with fresh new eyes. To find a new understanding of the purpose of life.
This is where the concept of never giving up comes into play. Every morning when you wake up, strive for joy. Be prepared to let go of those thoughts and those beliefs that weigh you down debilitatingly. Be ready and able every day to try a new path, a new thought, until you find the exit – and then you can take flight again.
Life is a jigsaw puzzle. Many parts fit, but many parts don’t fit also. And you have to move the pieces about in your heart and in your life continuously, often, and courageously in order to slowly put your answers together.
And, as you stride on along this way, try… try to be a little happy every day. In the end, that’s all you have. That’s all we have to share with one another. That is our humanity.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Undulating Plains
GIVING TIME AND SPACE
When someone asks for time and space
Give it to them
They are not necessarily running away from you
They might really just need time and space
To come to terms with the fact of you.
And if they are running away from you
Then there’s no need to want them close to you.
It’s not an insult or an attack
It’s just a chance to find true happiness for both of you
Each in their own way, own time and own space.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river
DRAW YOUR SECOND BREATH
When I first came to Germany, I died, slowly and gradually. And - this is the worst part - I died alone, inside my heart. Some might say it is a death Akin to the planted seed That dissolves inside the earth En route to being freed; Freed from the past and the old - The path to growth into the new. But death is empty, dark, cold. And lonely. I never knew. There is a path that leads back to life; Beware - it is more painful than death And it too with loneliness is rife From which will emerge your second breath. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
TAKE YOUR PAIN
Take your pain Don’t run from it Again and again Welcome it You will gain From the purge And after the rain A new you will emerge. Che Chidi Chukwumerije
RELAY
If every new generation
Rose up twice as high as the one before,
Humanity‘s elevation
Would see us soon knocking on heaven‘s door.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
LIGHTRISE
When more than the sun rises
And more than the moon is full
When enlightenment itself materialises
Upon and within your soul
When you awaken in the deepest sense
And the light of your spirit fills your eyes
Then shall you experience
The dawn of the morning Lightrise.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
INTUITION AND DEVELOPMENT
Environmental and spatial Beauty starts with Intuition, Art and Imagination. When you imagine it, draw it, design it, form it and then outwardly build it after that Image. Then suddenly you have outwardly what you crave and imagine inwardly. What you sense inwardly.
As simple as this may sound, this is the key to quantum leaps and to infinite development. This is the assurance that the boundaries of Genius will always be crossed, as long as we continue to march through Time, guided deeply by Intuitive Perception. Space is flexible, and bendable to Imagination and Inspiration.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
IF THE PEOPLE CHANGETH NOT
If you wake up one morning
And hear a bird out there
Sing a song you’ve heard before
But can’t remember where
Close your eyes and remember
The dream you’re waking from
And you’ll find yourself again
In a beautiful kingdom
Where the things you really feel
Are the things that you say
And it’s no big deal
To stand by what you say
And the people passing by
Are exactly as they seem
And they lift their country high
‘Cause they’re true to its dream
Then you wake up from the dream
And go into your world
And meet the opposite
Of what your dreams hold
Join the people, form a line
Queue up in the sun
Cast your votes for someone who
You hope has the wisdom
That the things she really felt
Are the things that she said
And the promises he spelt
Are the path that he’ll tread
And that when she passes by
She will be what she seems
And he’ll lift the country high
By working out her dreams
But the years they slowly pass
And the things hardly change
Sadly sadly ’cause the people
Are all still the same
Truth be told it makes no difference
Which of them the leader be
If the people changeth not
Well neither will their country
So pick your brooms and sweep your streets
And go to work on time
You may laugh at my simple words
But you’d be very surprised
That it’s just such little things
That have tied us down
Oh my people we’re the ones
Who give a face to our town
So the things we really feel
Are the things that we should say
It should be no big deal
To stand by what we say
And the people passing by
Should be just what they seem
And we lift our country high
‘Cause we work out our dream.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 