an old writer and his words

  • LINKAGE

    Linking things is a human need,tenuous forces barely holdingacross synapses easily brokenor lost, never to be replaced. Ithaca is forever joined withGalway City, and I still have notfigured out how to get the twopeople together as together isobviously what they should be. She sits at a small tablein the Commons, staring, waitingperhaps for a writer…

    Lou Faber

  • MY ANNA

    Along the banks of the barge canalin the village park, a manolder, his hair white, almosta mane, sits on the breakwallfeeding Wonder breadto the small flotilla of ducks.Tearing shreds of crustfrom a slice, he casts itonto the water and smilesas they bob for the crumbs.He tells them the storyof his life as thoughthey were his…

    Lou Faber

  • IMAGINE

    I think it might have beena passionate love letterI wrote to you last weekbut never delivered although there is the remotepossibility it was justour grocery list, bothhave line breaks after all, but it does show whyI must remember to checkthe pockets of my jeansbefore I put them in the washer. So let’s agree that it…

    Lou Faber

  • ALL BAD REASONS

    She says I should watch the game,the team I have followed sincewell since before I can rememberwhen. I am puzzled by which of myexcuses I should use to explainwhy I will not watch this game orany. I could tell her that I am a jinx andmy watching will cause them to losealthough I do frequently…

    Lou Faber

  • ON THE SHELF

    He found the cup by the curb one morning walking to the bus. He rarely notice things on his walk, thinking always about the day ahead. But this day he saw it, picked it up and put it in his messenger bag intending to clean it later, when he got home after work. He had…

    Lou Faber

  • DAYS LIKE THIS

    Then there are the dayswhen I play the buffoon,the juggler whose ballscome crashing to the floorbringing tears to the crowdof joy or sorrow, I cannothope to tell, for this dayI can only flail about,the circus clown, and youhad best keep your distancelest I break you as well.

    Lou Faber

  • THE GRADUATE

    You really ought to pauseand wonder just how differentthe world might be todayif in that crucial momentthings had gone ina wholly different direction. A single moment canset the course for allof the moments that follow,a definite future pluckedfrom an infinite arrayof possibilities. I mean, of course,that moment whenMr. McGuire, in the guiseof Walter Brooke turnsto…

    Lou Faber

  • THIS LAND (IS) WAS MY LAND

    I would very much liketo look down from above,unseen by those below,in my country, see the turmoilroiling so many, the linesformed at borders, a queuefor those deemed less valuable,and I wonder where in the linemy ancestors would bewere they still alive.I wonder what lifewould be like if Iwas born in Lithuaniaor if my parents never…

    Lou Faber

  • BOOK TWO

    So if I have it right, Godmanaged to come up with tenplagues for Moses to visiton Pharaoh, although at the timeMoses probably could notunderstand why it was ten,since God was boundlesslycreative, or so He told Moses. Maybe it dawned on Moseswhen wandering in the desertthat ten was a convenient number,after all, he only gave Mosesten…

    Lou Faber

  • WAR (an acrostic)

    SOMETIMES A POEM CANNOT WAIT From the moment it began, we knew, it was obvious that peace and freedom were under assault, Russia had thrown societal norms to the wind. Under gunmetal gray skies they attacked by air, killing women, children, destroying hospital, homes raining hell on the innocents with nowhere to turn. All we…

    Lou Faber