It’s like 10,000 years away It’s like you went away On that fateful day It repeats itself everyday. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
separation
VANISHING
Don’t come back after I’ve got used to your absence
Your absence has become your strongest presence
If you return too late you’ll only find yourself gone
Replaced by memory, you’ll be the invisible one.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Poems from the inner river
SILENT PLANETS
Some things are just not meant to be How ever hard you try to bring them about With a whimper, with a whisper, with a shout There is a planet Running away from a ray of light Coming from another planet Running in the other direction of night. They will never see each other Even though they sense that somewhere Another lonely planet is also out there. No whimper, no whisper, no shout - Silence is the satire of doubt. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
THE TURNING POINT
Sometimes you can‘t really tell When or why you lost interest in a person When exactly the bondage fell And you finally understood life’s lesson Being mediated to you through them A fallen leaf is a priceless gem It mothers and yields a new rising stem. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
UNVERMEIDBARE SCHMERZEN
In einander gehen
Oder sich voneinander trennen
So oder so
Es wird schmerzen
Zur Integration
Müssen alle Ja sagen
Zur Separation
Kann einer die Entscheidung tragen
So oder so
Es kommt von Herzen
Gewinne und Verluste
Es wird schmerzen.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Im Jahrzehnt der Deutschen Dichtung
SOFTLY’S SONG
Seven times we spoke out our love
And it was done
Readily we tread where doves still rove
Steadily we dance on into the grove
Within the sun, upon
The vow of a million and one words unspoken
Veiling the secret that dreams on unwoken
Tomorrow our love-vow shall reappear, unbroken,
And we shall be one.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
THE SPLIT
I’m quiet tonight
Never mind that it’s morning
I’m still dreaming
I remember a friend
We had high hopes for his future
Yet he chose the Easy
Now I’m all alone
On the road we once chose together
Watching it grow longer
This pain I keep inside
Greater than death, worse than loss
Treachery’s dungeons.
If I doubted reincarnation
This life has taught me a bitter lesson
For I must come again
The work is unfinished
The cards will be reshuffled
I will come again.
Then I hear, so soft
The sounds of morning dawning
The past is over now.
Those words, those strange words
That baffle the minds of politics
Of culture and science
You can call me Fool
You can call me mad, and yet
You too will come again.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
ONCE
Some things happen but
Once
In a lifetime…
It was here, it was there
It was where?
It is where?
It is gone…
It will never return.
-che chidi chukwumerije
DADDY DEAR
Ashes to ashes…
Dust to dust…
Spirit to spirit…
Have mercy, o Holy Ghost!
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Another anniversary of the day I beheld for the last time the noble countenance of my father. Then we closed the coffin and confered his cloak into the warm arms of Mother Earth. And set the spirt free for the Flight back Home. Always in my fondest Memories, Daddy dear… 22.5….
(Pic: my first day in Boarding School, Sep 1995 – King’s College. Lagos)
AGAIN
The punishment for being brave
Is having nothing to do
But be brave –
A tidal wave is rising in my soul.
The reward for being brave
Is having to do nothing
But be brave –
A tidal wave is crashing in my soul.
She warmed her cold tongue with
The flaming words of a passionate poet and
Lashed a gutter of decadent lava on
My soul.
Yet I told her still the truth
Again and again and again
And again and again, again
And again.
– che chidi chukwumerije
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 