The red leaves The brown bricks The orange clouds The yellow sticks The evening hues Illusion kicks in blended reality My mind’s tricks Make me feel Nature’s magic mix. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
magic
ODE TO LOVE
Love is a unique thing
It possesseth that quality
Which for want of comprehension entire
One feels inclined to call magic
It overcomes all obstacles
And, as an obstacle, cannot be overcome
How it does this, no one knows
But the Origin of Love itself
Open yourself to love
That it may full-fill you
The more you love,
The more you live.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
UNITED
If love is like this all the time
Then love is magic; and love and time
Are one.
So let it keep rolling, flowing, growing
When it doth snow, let it keep snowing
Until it’s done.
Because underneath the melting snow blanket
A new beginning of our love forms, and bank on it
We’ll still be one
When it’s done.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
CHRISTMAS: HEARTS OF BELL
I saw a bell
Fall under the spell
Of a magic wand
In a magician’s hand
And he turned the bell into a man
Walking up and down the land
Ringing out a message to everyone
But only a few will understand
I tell you what.
Affiliation to nationality and religion, gender, class and race
Will always be more important to the human race
Than being human, our common lot.
So now the bells, they are ringing
The hearts, they are singing
The times, they are bringing
A Message of Hope.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
IMAGINATION
They were not decorations on our wall
We were shadows on theirs
Flickering like candle thoughts
Gathering, falling and dispersing
Like broods of clouds
When we stand across the divide
Looking at each other, it’s hard to tell
Who is real
And who is the figment of whose imagination.
Writer, did you write your book
Or did your book write you?
Artist, did you paint that look
In the eye of the portrait watching you
Or are you just a thought in its mind?
If you look, sometimes you will find
That the musician is the instrument
And the song is the conductor of his movement.
And when an architect erects a building
He is only doing so to house therein his restless feelings.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
THE FARAWAY MAN
We came suddenly upon the path
Of the Faraway-man
We heard suddenly the flute he hath
Been using to call his clan
Birds, beasts, fish and fairies, all
Followed the Faraway-man
And man alone doth Heaven now call
The lonely faraway man.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
ELOPERS
It is a story that always breaks and
Runs away from its observers
Like the baffling speed of light
No outsider ever understands what is happening
When it’s happening
Always it breaks the fabric of logic
Only the two lovers themselves, only they
Who follow the inner call of shared love
Understand the logic of magic.
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
THE STRANGE BEAUTY OF A GOOD WOMAN
What, is it?
Struck, like thunderbolt
Thunder, and lightning
Yet gentle, as falling snow
Omnipresent, like substance
Everywhere, you turn it is
You cannot, hide away
From it
Once, it has caught you
In its tender, net –
It is love, some say
Pure, selfless love, they say
It is strange, is all I know
Makes, you ashamed
Afraid
And, after you have conquered, yourself
Weathered, shame and fear
It makes, you humble
And all you want, to do now
Strange
Is serve, the Almighty.
This is what, it does to you
This is what, it does to you
The strange beauty
Of, a good woman.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 