Little moments of life In the corners of strife Little stripes of light Hidden out of sight Hope is a melody, a song Where we all belong Sing along, old and young. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
song
WHERE ARE YOU?
Where are you?
There is a song in my head
Yearning to be sung to you
There is a thirst in my Soul
Waiting to be quenched by you
There is a smile in my heart
Longing to be smiled at you
So where are you?
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
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.
MAY SONG
The children come out to play
And all is happy and gay
In the month of May.
The farmers make their hay
In the shinning sun’s ray.
Hand in hand as they go their way
Young lovers whisper what they have to say
On their way to hear the new priest pray.
And following the song of the stock-bird jay
Gentle old couples of yesterday
Quietly remember their youth today.
The essentials will stay
When all else goes away.
This is the song in the heart of May.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
WINDOWS AGAIN
The same song, the same gong
The same sound
It is all bound up in the same one
Concept –
I conceptualise, I discover, I am, I am not
I conceptualise, I know, I know not, I grow
A bell opened up and let out a melody
Ten thousand Songs, memory.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
SEVENTEEN POEMS
If I wrote seventeen poems
In one word
Would you understand my language?
If I wrote one word
Sung one love-song
In seventeen poems
Would you understand my language?
What if they were eight?
What if they were eighteen?
If every human smile were a poem
Every laugh a song
Every look a promise
If every human word were silence
You would not need seventeen poems
To understand me
Just one.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
BLUE
She told me the tongue
Is the instrument of the heart
Learn to use it well, for song
And touch, to part and to impart
I tell you this, she said
Because you make my tongue restless
Then I knew what she wanted
A drink of tenderness
Blue was that night
And underneath the mango tree
Me warm me hands in her fireside
She sang of honey
Yet, though she’s melting me, watching me
Still my admiration is voiceless, deadpan
Words of flattery would be
A waste of woman.
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
KNOCKIN’ BOOTS
***
Last night something strange
Cracked a door open on the wall
Of my memory, without even knockin’ twice
It came out of nowhere, suddenly.
A song, I was 17, house party
Whose house? I don’t remember any more
There she was, in the dark
Dancing with me, like I was the night wind
She a young tree, swaying, leaves shuddering slowly
Two shadows in a room full of shadows
House of teenagers about to wake up
From youth with only memories faded of yesterday
How long did this song quietly travel
Through time, to waylay me in that lookback moment last night
And take me back to that other night so many years ago?
Every memory I think I’ve forgotten
Is stored in some song somewhere, seeking me again
So don’t ask me why I’m dancing oldskool
Time is a candyman, stuck to your melting heart
Memory memory will knock your boots back
Never ever ever gonna let you go
Where is she now? My young mango.
She is a part of this song now
And last night I saw her, danced with her, again.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerijeem>
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 