Poetry is not just an art form to me; it is the very air I breathe. It began as a lifeline, a voice for the silence I could never articulate. While others weave their thoughts into rhythms and stanzas, I found my own words trapped, bottled up, suffocating beneath an invisible weight. Poetry became the space where I could release that pressure, the language I had been waiting for all my life.
As a child, I learned early to be silent. The youngest of many, I was relegated to the edges of conversations, expected to listen, never to speak. But it wasn’t just quietness that defined me, it was the relentless pressure that built up inside. I was like a mountain, vast yet contained, my thoughts and emotions churning like a storm ready to burst. The more I tried to speak, the more I found my voice slipping away; too many words, too little room to let them out.
In those moments, books became my refuge. I devoured wuxia web novels (published by Wuxiaworld), enchanted by the stories of martial heroes and their boundless journeys. It was through these pages that I first felt the stirrings of understanding, like a long-lost connection with something larger than myself. The characters spoke my unvoiced fears, joys, and sorrows. I didn’t just read; I felt the stories. I saw their colours, tasted their bitterness, heard the rhythm of their pain. For the first time, I realised that someone else had felt what I was feeling, and through their words, I was seen. It was a revelation.
Photo by Mo Eid via www.pexels.com
But it wasn’t until the isolation of the Covid-19 lockdown that I discovered the true power of poetry. It was a strange, quiet time, when the world had stopped but emotions had not. In that stillness, I stumbled upon an online platform where writers shared their work, raw and unfiltered. Their words bled across the page, each line a map of the human heart. Something about their honesty gave me the courage to write my first poem:
White and black
Light and dark
A bit of both
Yet none to note
A bright blue day sky
A pain-filled night life
A dawn to dream
A dusk to scream
Some say it’s good
Some have no food
A Grey World, isn’t it?
Who can destroy it?
Many, yet only One
Gehenna will feast, sworn!
Gratitude
You will know.
—A Grey World, Precious Chibeze
The first poem was an explosion of what had been held back for so long. Like the sudden cracking of ice, it allowed the flood of emotions inside me to pour out, unrestrained. What had been bottled up for years, this mountain of words and feelings, was finally released. It was the first conversation I’d had with myself, not just about the world, but about my own inner world. Each line of that first poem, no matter how imperfect, brought me closer to understanding myself, my hidden fears, my desires, my truths. Poetry became my friend, the one person who could hold space for everything I had kept locked away.
Photo byArlind D via www.pexels.com
But it wasn’t just about expressing myself; poetry became a way to connect. It was as if, through each verse, I could speak directly to another soul. It wasn’t just me alone in my silence anymore. Through poetry, I found a kind of communion; an unspoken understanding between myself and the reader. When I read, I felt their pain as my own; when I wrote, I invited others into mine. It was a bridge, spanning across time and space, built of words and shared experiences.
Over time, I discovered that my mind clogs easily. The constant rush of thoughts, the endless noise, the uncertainty; it piles up until it becomes unbearable. Poetry became the only way to clear that mental fog. Each word, each line, is a breath, a moment of release in the chaos. It is my anchor in a world that pulls me in a thousand directions, offering me a space to breathe, to pause, to understand.
And then, there was this poem:
I found you
Somewhere between yesterday and forever
Without clue
You came into my world, full of curiosity and colour
Fell for you
In all your strength, my butterflies and my comforter
Broken, due
My only remains, a hurt soul and a torn attire
I lost you
Somewhere between yesterday and forever.
—Somewhere Between Yesterday and Forever, Precious Chibeze
This poem marked a shift. It was no longer just a reflection of my internal world; it was a moment of vulnerability. I had written about loss before, but never with such weight. The absence that followed the loss felt as tangible as the ground beneath my feet, and I realised that writing about it brought me closer to healing. Poetry wasn’t just about expression anymore, it was a means of processing, of growing.
Photo by FBO Media via www.pexels.com
And there is something timeless about poetry. It transcends the boundaries of the moment, the boundaries of the self. I’ve read poems written centuries ago and felt their agony, their hope, their longing, as though they were written just for me. The beauty of poetry is that it does not wither; it lingers, like the aftertaste of something sweet or bitter, never quite leaving, always waiting for the right person to breathe life back into it.
And one last poem I must share with you:
What are your convictions
How rooted are you in the things you believe
Are your beliefs aiding your life and actions
Or do they limit and leave you to grieve
Do you even know what you hold as truth
Or are you of those lost ones tossed by the wind
What will you build in your youth
Will you labour into rest or will you remain blind
Are you one of those floating in the rivers of time
Knowing nothing but to flow with the masses
Do you dream of a life you don’t build and climb
Have you lost your sense of self to the ashes
Life has a business of asking questions that must be answered
Questions that test you, your ideals and your reality
Through situations that will leave you bared of excuses and bewildered
Battering all beliefs you once hid behind and exposing your mentality
These are questions that will haunt until replied
Questions that taunt until they are defied
Questions that bind until they are untied
Fleeing is futile, for the game of tag is brutal
In time, you will answer
Strongly or wrongly, you will answer
In triumph or defeat, you will answer
Seek to answer rightly, so those to come after you won’t wander the world blinded like you were
So they won’t toil in realities hatched from your life
What are your convictions.
—What Are Your Convictions, Precious Chibeze
Photo by Maksim Goncharenok via www.pexels.com
This poem was a culmination of everything I had learned through writing. It is a declaration, a confrontation with my own ideals, with what I believe to be true, with what I must face before I can grow. The questions posed in this poem are not just for me, but for all of us. They linger, asking us to confront ourselves, to answer or be bound by our own indecision. And in that confrontation, poetry has taught me that we are not alone. We may be individual voices, but we are all part of something larger.
Poetry is not merely a means of self-expression; it is a way of being. It is the language of the heart, the soul, and the mind, speaking in ways that words alone cannot capture. It is a bridge between individuals, between generations, between the past and the future. It is my constant companion, my release, my understanding of the world. Poetry has freed me from the mountain of silence I once carried. And I cannot imagine a life without it.
Poetry is not just an art form to me; it is the very air I breathe. It began as a lifeline, a voice for the silence I could never articulate. While others weave their thoughts into rhythms and stanzas, I found my own words trapped, bottled up, suffocating beneath an invisible weight. Poetry became the space where I could release that pressure, the language I had been waiting for all my life.
As a child, I learned early to be silent. The youngest of many, I was relegated to the edges of conversations, expected to listen, never to speak. But it wasn’t just quietness that defined me, it was the relentless pressure that built up inside. I was like a mountain, vast yet contained, my thoughts and emotions churning like a storm ready to burst. The more I tried to speak, the more I found my voice slipping away; too many words, too little room to let them out.
In those moments, books became my refuge. I devoured wuxia web novels (published by Wuxiaworld), enchanted by the stories of martial heroes and their boundless journeys. It was through these pages that I first felt the stirrings of understanding, like a long-lost connection with something larger than myself. The characters spoke my unvoiced fears, joys, and sorrows. I didn’t just read; I felt the stories. I saw their colours, tasted their bitterness, heard the rhythm of their pain. For the first time, I realised that someone else had felt what I was feeling, and through their words, I was seen. It was a revelation.
But it wasn’t until the isolation of the Covid-19 lockdown that I discovered the true power of poetry. It was a strange, quiet time, when the world had stopped but emotions had not. In that stillness, I stumbled upon an online platform where writers shared their work, raw and unfiltered. Their words bled across the page, each line a map of the human heart. Something about their honesty gave me the courage to write my first poem:
White and black
Light and dark
A bit of both
Yet none to note
A bright blue day sky
A pain-filled night life
A dawn to dream
A dusk to scream
Some say it’s good
Some have no food
A Grey World, isn’t it?
Who can destroy it?
Many, yet only One
Gehenna will feast, sworn!
Gratitude
You will know.
—A Grey World, Precious Chibeze
The first poem was an explosion of what had been held back for so long. Like the sudden cracking of ice, it allowed the flood of emotions inside me to pour out, unrestrained. What had been bottled up for years, this mountain of words and feelings, was finally released. It was the first conversation I’d had with myself, not just about the world, but about my own inner world. Each line of that first poem, no matter how imperfect, brought me closer to understanding myself, my hidden fears, my desires, my truths. Poetry became my friend, the one person who could hold space for everything I had kept locked away.
But it wasn’t just about expressing myself; poetry became a way to connect. It was as if, through each verse, I could speak directly to another soul. It wasn’t just me alone in my silence anymore. Through poetry, I found a kind of communion; an unspoken understanding between myself and the reader. When I read, I felt their pain as my own; when I wrote, I invited others into mine. It was a bridge, spanning across time and space, built of words and shared experiences.
Over time, I discovered that my mind clogs easily. The constant rush of thoughts, the endless noise, the uncertainty; it piles up until it becomes unbearable. Poetry became the only way to clear that mental fog. Each word, each line, is a breath, a moment of release in the chaos. It is my anchor in a world that pulls me in a thousand directions, offering me a space to breathe, to pause, to understand.
And then, there was this poem:
I found you
Somewhere between yesterday and forever
Without clue
You came into my world, full of curiosity and colour
Fell for you
In all your strength, my butterflies and my comforter
Broken, due
My only remains, a hurt soul and a torn attire
I lost you
Somewhere between yesterday and forever.
—Somewhere Between Yesterday and Forever, Precious Chibeze
This poem marked a shift. It was no longer just a reflection of my internal world; it was a moment of vulnerability. I had written about loss before, but never with such weight. The absence that followed the loss felt as tangible as the ground beneath my feet, and I realised that writing about it brought me closer to healing. Poetry wasn’t just about expression anymore, it was a means of processing, of growing.
And there is something timeless about poetry. It transcends the boundaries of the moment, the boundaries of the self. I’ve read poems written centuries ago and felt their agony, their hope, their longing, as though they were written just for me. The beauty of poetry is that it does not wither; it lingers, like the aftertaste of something sweet or bitter, never quite leaving, always waiting for the right person to breathe life back into it.
And one last poem I must share with you:
What are your convictions
How rooted are you in the things you believe
Are your beliefs aiding your life and actions
Or do they limit and leave you to grieve
Do you even know what you hold as truth
Or are you of those lost ones tossed by the wind
What will you build in your youth
Will you labour into rest or will you remain blind
Are you one of those floating in the rivers of time
Knowing nothing but to flow with the masses
Do you dream of a life you don’t build and climb
Have you lost your sense of self to the ashes
Life has a business of asking questions that must be answered
Questions that test you, your ideals and your reality
Through situations that will leave you bared of excuses and bewildered
Battering all beliefs you once hid behind and exposing your mentality
These are questions that will haunt until replied
Questions that taunt until they are defied
Questions that bind until they are untied
Fleeing is futile, for the game of tag is brutal
In time, you will answer
Strongly or wrongly, you will answer
In triumph or defeat, you will answer
Seek to answer rightly, so those to come after you won’t wander the world blinded like you were
So they won’t toil in realities hatched from your life
What are your convictions.
—What Are Your Convictions, Precious Chibeze
This poem was a culmination of everything I had learned through writing. It is a declaration, a confrontation with my own ideals, with what I believe to be true, with what I must face before I can grow. The questions posed in this poem are not just for me, but for all of us. They linger, asking us to confront ourselves, to answer or be bound by our own indecision. And in that confrontation, poetry has taught me that we are not alone. We may be individual voices, but we are all part of something larger.
Poetry is not merely a means of self-expression; it is a way of being. It is the language of the heart, the soul, and the mind, speaking in ways that words alone cannot capture. It is a bridge between individuals, between generations, between the past and the future. It is my constant companion, my release, my understanding of the world. Poetry has freed me from the mountain of silence I once carried. And I cannot imagine a life without it.
By Precious Chibeze