an old writer and his words

  • MEMORIAL

    This woman approaches the stone, carefully places sake and cherry blossoms and leans a sotoba against it, before bowing and walking away. It is what you do for a son, she says, looking at the bibbed Jizo hoping she can protect the child who lies beneath. That woman approaches the headstone, gently places the flowers and leans…

    Lou Faber

  • COYOTE SONG

    Down at the butt end of the arroyo is a pond, an aneurysm in the stream that runs down from the mountains for better than a month each spring. The twisted, gnarled mesquite cluster around it, like children gazing at a corpse in utter fascination who dare not approach lest it become real and touch…

    Lou Faber

  • NARA PARK

    I Ducks skitter across Ara-ike pond like a perfectly thrown skipping stone. Two sit and preen on large rocks left as pedestals. A spider dragging its prey along the weathered wood railing of the bridge pauses for a moment to contemplate ducks, then moves on consumed by hunger. II Several deer languish among the wizened…

    Lou Faber

  • ZEN

    He has just turned two. He sits on my lap one hand clapping mine, for each of us a moment of Zen in ways no one can understand, since neither he nor I do. His laugh promises something, a future of moments like this, and yet never the same. “It is our river,” his smile…

    Lou Faber

  • WALKING AMONG SAND AND PEBBLES: SHASEKI-SHU

    CUP OF TEA             沙石集  一  When the cup is half full what more can be added? In the garden, the moon can exist in a full cup or one only half full. It is the empty cup that can hold entire universes, infinite in capacity.   FINDING A DIAMOND                  沙石集  二  There are endless paths…

    Lou Faber

  • A DIFFERENT SKY

    We lie on a hill side by side, staring up at the passing clouds, discerning shapes, both of us break into a smile, each of us sees a completely different sky. After some time I reach out and touch her hand, our fingers interlace, or perhaps it is she who reached out to me, fingers intertwined.…

    Lou Faber

  • STONE

    Off the pier in Santa Barbara a young child throws a stone into the quiet ocean. Later an imperceptible wave slips quietly into Yokohama harbor. In Big Sur a Monarch butterfly slips from her chrysalis on tentative gossamer wings and takes flight. Later, still,  I stand on the Boston Commons and cast a momentary smile.

    Lou Faber

  • TOKYO

    Walking the grounds of Senso-ji Temple, I look among the statues, half expecting Buddha or Kannon Bosatsu to appear, but only a pigeon answers my expectations. Lighting a joss bundle and placing it into the burner I imagine for a moment that I am zainichi, but the giggles of a flock of uniformed schoolgirls reminds me cruelly…

    Lou Faber

  • SEASIDE VILLANELLE

    The ocean wind swept through the city a sudden rain washed sidewalk, shop and street, carried both dreams and sins back to the sea. For the young child, time slid by easily, life a campaign that allowed no retreat. The ocean wind swept through the city, rattled church windows, so that all could see the…

    Lou Faber

  • LISTENING TO THE FLUTE

    YAKUSAN HOLDS IT         鐵笛倒吹 十  Sit just above the peak of the highest mountain and reach up with open fingers, what will you grasp? Walk slowly across the floor of  the deepest sea, what do you see below you? If you have three daughters is any one less beautiful than the others?   JOSHU COVERS…

    Lou Faber