an old writer and his words

  • RINZAI’S ENLIGHTENMENT 正法眼蔵 二十七

      If you ask your question you will find an answer but ask another and the stick will respond each time. If you seek another teacher will you change the question or the answer, and does it matter. Take up the stick, who will you strike, your teacher or yourself, and is there any real…

    Lou Faber

  • NOTA BENE

    Sometime this week you will get a note. You will not know who it is from, and you won’t be at all certain just what it is supposed to mean, but you will carefully fold it, place it in your pocket and later put it in a safe place along with all the other notes…

    Lou Faber

  • MEMENTO VIVERE

    The moment arrives suddenly and appears at your feet, threatening to trip you into the hole of time that marks the edge of this moment as it once did the one before this. If you stand perfectly still You may move forward with the easy grace of enlightenment.

    Lou Faber

  • QUANTUM GRAVITATION: ADOPTION

    Quantum gravitation, I strongly suggest, is something on which you cannot really count. I know all things are supposed to be relative but as an only and adopted child I have none, for me relativity is something special and generally the lack weighs heavily.

    Lou Faber

  • AUTUMN

      Once again I can imagine it arriving one morning probably unannounced. I won’t see it coming until I find myself in the middle of it, wrapped up within, always knowing that it will slide away without warning and the leaves will fall in regret.

    Lou Faber

  • JIZO PLANTS THE FIELD

    If you truly want to walk in the footsteps of the Buddha stand perfectly still and unmoving. If you truly want to comprehend the whole of the Dharma put down all of your books and scrolls, roll up your sleeves and plant the barren fields, clearing away rocks and stones. If you want to taste…

    Lou Faber

  • NO MONSTER HERE

    Macbeth had a witches problem, but that hardly made him unique. It’s true that Scottish witches are more difficult to deal with than those of much of the rest of Western Europe, something to do with being under English dominion for so damned long that Erse is a nearly forgotten tongue, but you’d think a…

    Lou Faber

  • TAKE WING

      There comes a moment when, if our backs are turned, it will arrive and if we notice it will withdraw and hide in corners. We may see it in the periphery and sneak up on it. If we move quickly enough, we can snatch it up and watch it fly off into the morning.

    Lou Faber

  • UMMON’S TWO SICKNESSES

      If you truly believe that you will soon enough meet your teacher you must gather together all of your questions concerning the Dharma. Carry them with you at all times in a satchel thrown over your shoulder, for you will be allowed only a single meeting with the master. When you meet the master,…

    Lou Faber

  • MOMENT(US) ARRIVAL

    Sooner or later the moment arrives when there is no option left and you have to decide. There are never facts enough, or time – uncertainty is a most unwelcome companion. In this moment indecision is not an allowed outcome and every selection is at once right and wrong.

    Lou Faber