an old writer and his words

  • TEACHING AND NOT TEACHING

    We walk forwards to try to see where we are going, always wanting but never seeing where we have been. Is it better to walk backward seeing clearly where we will not go without idea of a destination. Look down and decide. A reflection on Case 92 of the Shobogenzo (Dogen’s True Dharma Eye)  

    Lou Faber

  • ADIRONDACK EVENING

    Atop the hill the trees are filigree against the fading light. The tents are fireflies twinkling as night reclaims the earth. I am caught up in the chill watching my breath kiss the stars. First Appeared in Blueline, Vol. 22, 2001. Reprinted in Legal Studies Forum, Vol. 29, No. 1, 2005

    Lou Faber

  • RUYGE’S ULTIMATE STAGE鐵笛倒吹 二十八

      If you answer the question I will ask you another each more difficult. If you enter a room and catalog its contents there will always be a door leading to yet another room, another inventory to be taken to determine what is there and what is missing. It is only when you enter an…

    Lou Faber

  • OF DREAMS

    In our small world night and day are separated by dreams that escape just beyond our consciousness. We search for deeper meaning even as we are certain they will leave us as they have long before we could remember. That is the trouble with margins, they ebb and flow without warning, their arrivals and departures…

    Lou Faber

  • DAIZUI’S GREAT KALPA FIRE 正法眼蔵 二十四

    All things are born and die so if this world dies at the end of its cycle of life and we are here, do we die with this world and which of us will be first reborn. Only when the mind collapses is the world born only when the mind collapses does the world die.…

    Lou Faber

  • THE FUTURE’S PAST, PRESENTLY

    Before the after now is present. It was never like this before it will not be again anytime soon for there is no time soon that has yet to be or just gone by. After the before we find ourselves here and now.

    Lou Faber

  • FLIGHT

    One thousand cranes take flight and there is a sudden silence as the cat stares up, bidding them farewell. We barely stop to notice, despite the rainbow of colors replacing the clouds, even the sun seeming to pause in wonder. Two thousand hands made this happen, one person, unrelenting, knowing anything less would be nothing…

    Lou Faber

  • HEART OF NIGHT

    The morphology of dreams is partially reliant on the whims of a single god, and Morpheus is, to say the least, a truly fickle bastard who dangles before us joy and nightmare each always just out of reach, but never out of sight or hearing. So we are left to grasp like marionettes operated by…

    Lou Faber

  • RAISON

      There is a reason – there must be a reason for everything, that is just how things are supposed to be, how we decree them. And when things are events, we are at liberty to tell them to comply with our direction. If they fail, then we consign them to miracles or the work…

    Lou Faber

  • VISIONS

    The small child peers through the bamboo poles of the bridge as he stares down at a turtle who stares up at him with equal fascination. His mother excitedly says, “see the turtle?” Of course he can see the turtle but he also sees an Ichthyosaurus and giant whales and frightening fish. Later, as she…

    Lou Faber