an old writer and his words

  • HUMANITY

    Each day I walk out into the sea. Each day the sea engulfs me. I cannot walk on the water, nor does the water part before me. Each day I walk out into the sea and reconfirm my humanity. In my prior life as a Corporate attorney, I was profiled in the ACC Docket, the…

    Lou Faber

  • FLOWING

      A young man stands on the bank a river and sees the water toppling over and around uncaring stones. Halfway up the slope of the great mountain an old man steps from his small hut looks down at a hawk circling the river, watching for the glint of a passing salmon. From its aerie…

    Lou Faber

  • SEAL SONG

    A young woman holds a mirror out to the sea as she sings a simple, sweet song to a cloud which lingers overhead. You want to ask her about this but you are afraid – afraid that she will forget the song and the small cloud that is your only shade will slip into the…

    Lou Faber

  • BAREFOOT

    He says his favorite clouds all wear size seven shoes. He knows she believes she once saw a paisley rainbow and will never forget it. She wears size seven shoes and her tears can be torrential, yet they can still nurture the first flowers of spring. He imagines her a butterfly sitting on the back…

    Lou Faber

  • BASHO’S DREAMS

    on the sacred lake lotus blossoms grasp the sun Buddha steps lightly   Buddha cares little for the endless prostrations preferring Summer   setting summer sun turns the river to purple moon comes from hiding

    Lou Faber

  • SLEEPING

    In the Virginia countryside men have dug an enormous hole. Some say it is for the stone to pave their streets, build their homes. Some say it was dug out of spite. The young child looking out the window of the plane knows and simply says it is a burrow where all the stars and moon…

    Lou Faber

  • PICNIC

    A cloud envelopes the forest.  The trees believe it is they who pierce the cloud, impaling it, its essence drained onto their sagging limbs.  The shower passes and we walk the forest floor.  In a small clearing we lie down on a damp bed of needles.  They do not pierce our skin.  Four birds gather…

    Lou Faber

  • THE HERMIT

    The hermit lives in the shadow of the great mountain listening to the symphony of the bluebird and the wild Rose engulfed by the sky, the meandering stream his constant companion. I live in a city in a sea of city dwellers each of us prisoners marching from cell to cell, with passing nods we…

    Lou Faber

  • NARA

    The clouds shimmer in echo of the peel of the great temple bell. Hearing the chorus of monks, a small red maple sheds a leaf. It is the butterfly whose wings gavotte to the inkin bell which causes waves to lap the shore of a distant sea.

    Lou Faber

  • BULLET TRAIN

    From the window of a speeding train the rice fields seem like carpets, today the gold of the alchemist’s dream, just months ago the green of imagined grasses over the next hill. When I sit down to dinner in Osaka, will the rice nestled in my chopsticks tell me of the dreams of those who…

    Lou Faber