It was autumn when we met
Trees were reddening
Leaves were falling
Hearts were aching to spill the truth
Autumn, autumn
Cooler nights
Autumn, autumn
Mistier heights
It was autumn when we met
Days were shortening
Eyes were focusing more sharply
On every strange new thing –
To discern the whole truth
Before the snow-blanket
Stored any promises
About to be made –
Diamonds and promises are forever.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
To make a promise to love another person, forever, and then to break this promise and say, Goodbye baby… awakens within the hearts of everybody who hears of it a memory of their own broken and unspoken promises.
Noise everywhere. Noise in my head. Noise even in the centre of silence. Lovers are what sages once were, and vice versa. Heartbreak and promises, togetherness, farewells and silence are all trying to resolve themselves within our hearts.
I should never have told you that I loved you, but how could I but not tell the truth? Evermore I understand the importance of silence. Our hearts are broken in silence: a small token to pay for the new powers which soon and steadily awaken in silence within us.
One who can bear the pain of heartbreak; one who can say goodbye and yet always be there; one who can preserve promises in silence unbroken; will read these lines with a knowing smile.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Kingdom of oil and salt
Swishing tales swipe the sand
Behind vanishing storytellers, nay, dreampreachers
With high-sounding verses
They promised us a great future
Where are they now?
Where are they now, to see us
Reaping locusts and riffling through
Sheaves of worrisome mirrors
For, how closely the future mirrors the past!
Eyeballs hypnosis of rearview mirrors
Nobody driving the car forward.
Too much salt!
Do you hear my tongue burning
A song of sadness into your ears?
Too much heat! To look back
While walking forward is folly
New generation, is folly.
New generation. This name mocks you
Like it mocked before your time
Every generation that came and left.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 