The world is a buffet All you can meet Humanity at the venue All you can greet Kindness on the menu All you can treat Love and pain the entree All you can eat. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
thirst
DISTANCE
I have a longing for intimacy
Not satisfied by sex
A craving for voyeurism
Not quenched by porn
A yearning for universal entanglement
Not gratified by orgies
And a need for intense borderlessness
Not staked by perversity
What is it?
I have an itch for mystification
Not calmed by lying
A desire for friction
Not stilled by confrontation
A propensity for destruction
Not quelled by murder
And a burning for escape
Not silenced by suicide
What is it?
It’s like I am separated from myself
And watch myself through a window
And everything that I do
Is actually being done by my shadow
While I wait for something real
Really really real.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
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.
IN A LAND OF WATER
Water water everywhere
Why is the world full of water?
The earth like a primeval bowl
Has been filled with water from a pitcher
Tilted down over a heavenly shoulder
High above the material sphere
Where love flows everywhere
Where the spirits never thirst
Where the urge to help alone comes first –
Take me there, take me there, take me there.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
MY FLAMING HEART
How many women
Can quench my thirst?
How many loves
Can calm my racing heart?
How many homes
Can contain all my feelings?
My flaming heart
Will have its piece
My flaming heart
Will have its peace
O flaming heart
Be still, be still…
The wind is blowing
The river is flowing –
Peace, be still.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
TRAVELLER BEWARE
Wary of thirst
Wary of wandering
Weary, I wet my cup
In a wellspring I met
By the wayside
And when I put my lip
To its wet lip, the cup shivered
For bitter was the bile
That rose up from the well
And choked its heart
Traveller, it sang, in a voice
That wavered in the distance
Guard your thirst –
For not every bird that sings
Sings of dawn.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
LOVING BOTH
Just like on quiet stealthy
Hesitant feet
Autumn circles and stalks
Summer’s heat
My thoughts reminisce
My heart’s sweet defeat
My dreams learn to become
Silent and discrete
’Twas never love
That broke a heart
Love never was spurned
That understood the art
Of stoking desire
By slaking its thirst
And stoking desire
By letting it thirst
And knowing the difference
Between the two
Is loving Summer
And Autumn too.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
BOTTOMLESS WELL
Everyday she printed dust on feet
Earlier than sunrise
She was a surprise
To every sleeping wanderer she will meet
On her way to the well, wishing well,
An empty bucket on her head
One more in each hand that bled
On her way to hell
The well, the well is dry
It is dry, barren, unresponsive
The less you get, the more you give
The desert will never cry
Every evening she dusts her way home
Not a drop of water
To herself she will mutter
Soliloquy on when the rain will come.
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
GRASS
Some smoke grass
Some cut grass, they love to mow the lawn
Some play in grass
Some spread a blanket on the grass
And sleep in the sun –
What a waste of grass.
When I see grass, I touch it
I stroke it, tickle it, sniff it, blow it gently
Then I grab it, clutch it with my full fist
And pull it hard until she cries
Then slowly I part it
And slide my snakes into
The deep dark pool of thirst
Lurking beneath your moist grass
Like a longing craving for primeval release
Grass makes me high, so high
So fucking high…
When I see the grass
I shall pass over you
And plant my seed.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
TAKE HER ACHING
I met a girl in the dark
I’m hurt, she said, hurt me
You’re singing in riddles, I said
She shook her head intensely
Her eyes were full of things she could not say
I’m in pain, she moaned, give me more
Crooked words lead straight to truth
Those who love each other hurt each other
And die wanting each other, immortally.
– CHE CHIDI CHUKWUMERIJE.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 