No one else but you - Is this magic? Is this juju? There is value in virtue More powerful than voodoo. No one else but you I just had to woo you And once I sort of knew you I just had to do you. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
you
THE JOURNEY OF YOUR “I”
The miracle of life transcends the earth. The adventures of the “I” Survive many an earthly death and rebirth And a “Beyond” not in the Sky But right here beside you And much too often beneath you. Your Journey is shaping the Real you. This is really the purpose of it all - Not the Earthly but the Spiritual, the true inner personality, you the actual person, you, you, you! Eternity requires integrity, and self-conquest is our path thereto in the struggle with the Material. Che Chidi Chukwumerije Poems from the inner river
STATE OF BEING YOU
It’s hard to get excited when you see through everyone and everything.
And also when you’ve seen through your own self to the core, it’s hard to whip up enthusiasm for things you know well are not you or yours. It’s like a kind of boredom.
Only your small simple little things satisfy your life now and you tend to just want to stick to them, whether the world says they’re right or wrong. They’re yours.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
IT TAKES TIME TO BE FREE
After I had rid myself
Of my father’s voice in my head
And my mother’s voice in my heart
And society’s voice in my ears
And fear’s voice in my throat
I stopped on a quiet morning
And listened to the sound of
My own voice
My own thoughts
My own intuition
My own will
My own way of seeing myself and seeing the world
And oh! How different it was
From what I had once thought was me.
Dazed in this silence
I looked and looked at me and me
Getting used to the sight … and feel… of me I
For it’s new when the mirror becomes an open window
Now I know why liberated birds hesitate before flying away
And why they take a while to get their bearing
And why they never return once they feel at home again in the wild.
– che chidi chukwumerije.
HOMETOWN OF THE SOUL
There is no other reward than finding yourself
The reward is finding yourself
And experiencing the joy of being yourself
It might seem like a small reward to you now
But when you’ve tasted everything else
Then you’ll understand that this is the greatest reward
Anything that emerges from deep within me
Is native to me
My hometown is a state of being
My state of being.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
AN OBSERVANT LAKE
How much of it is left?
How much of the mist
Still revisits my mornings
Before my thoughts come calling?
From afar, I
Mean from gazing
Across time, it
Is a wonder to hold in
Your heart a
Thing that never
Fades, never
Weakens, changes
Never, teaches you how
To know the
Things you really
Love. They are the
Ones you never
Forget.
This carry with you as you mature
Measure with this everything you nurture
The camera behind your mind
Will click and capture
A lifelong picture
Of the things that slipped through,
The people and places that got to the core of you.
It will continue to happen inside, an observant lake
Like another part of you.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Cumbrian Lines: Poems Inspired By The Lake District.
FISHERMAN
Daily my heart weeps
My soul is drenched in a river
Flowing with thoughts of you
Of late I have become
A fisherman
Richly rewarded for my toil
Bravely diving into the lake of love
Daily my heart weeps
With joy.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
ANOTHER ME
With every flight my thoughts take
In the sight of my heart
You become to me ever more natural…
A natural extension
No pretension.
I met you in your every age
At every which one of your many life-stages
I know your low, your high
Your I, for I have looked you in the Eye.
We shall grow. This is not the end
A new task. Opened, a new flask
Undone. Another mask, unmasked.
Another you. Another me.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
FREED
Hardly a night goes by
Hardly a breath flows, an evening
Melts
Without this thought
You brighten my life
Curly windows
When the crowds are many
I am alone
I wanted to be a nightingale
To be a flower
I wanted to be a star
The evening wind blows
I am human. Let it be…
Sometimes again
Freed from the city’s shackles
Hackles, hard tackles
I am green, bright yellow, blue as sky
Glad am I.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
GIFT
Give me you.
Before you begin to wonder
What you are, remember
That each star and each season
Is nature’s gift for a reason
And you, dear spirit, your blossoming heart
Is spirit’s gift to the gift of art
It is the art of being you.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 