an old writer and his words

  • ARRIGATO, GAZAIMUS

    The old man walks slowly through the opulent lobby the light of the triple chandeliers refracted into a thousand spectra that dance on mirrored walls. The guard gently touches his elbow steering him as though he is blind drunk, while the bellman walks a step behind, like Charlton Heston through an invisible sea. The man…

    Lou Faber

  • RIVERSIDE

    The great bronze kings of the Chosun Dynasty look down from Mount Namsan over the city, valleys of small homes, neatly tiled roofs over ramshackle walls, with small gardens clustered atop amid clothes drying racks and cars careening along narrow streets. The old woman wraps the pink towel around on her scalp like some garish…

    Lou Faber

  • DHARMA

    In Tibet there are more than 80 words to describe states of consciousness, several words to explain the sound of prayer flags rustling in a Himalayan breeze that reaches up to the crest of the peaks that lick at the slowly gathering clouds, all of these words never uttered. There are no words in Tibet…

    Lou Faber

  • LATE NIGHT, RITZ CARLTON, SEOUL

    A seemingly endless stream of young Thai men pour out of room 314 like so many clowns tumbling out of a miniature Volkswagen Beetle in the center ring. They laugh, chattering, lacking only oversized shoes to complete the image. They stand by the elevator in a contagion of giggles. After half an hour they return,…

    Lou Faber

  • ALL MANNER OF THINGS

    Outside Itaewon she leans perpetually forward as though straining against the gales of life. Her cane beats a tattoo on the pavement, as she drives her bent frame to the bus. Nearing the door a young man bustles by, receiving her cane across his shin for his indiscretion. Assuming her seat, as though a throne,…

    Lou Faber

  • ISOLATION

    She wondered what it would be like to be an island, set off somewhere in a vast ocean, tropical preferably where the only sounds were the ebb and flow of the waves, the thunder of the occasional storm and the whisper of leaves tossed by the omnipresent sea breezes. she liked isolation, the silence of…

    Lou Faber

  • AN AFTERNOON SPENT

    We sit around a small table in the YAK Coffee and Beer on the edge of Namdaemun listening to loud pop songs on tinny speakers. The Hite Beer bottles sweat dripping on the Formica table down our backs the dankness of the subway clinging to us, bathed in the smoke from the couples hunched over…

    Lou Faber

  • FUJI

    Looking out the window of the Osaka bound train at the great snow-covered mountain I saw, for just a moment my face on its slopes. Staring down at the train hurtling across the fields, the great Fuji smiled briefly before returning to its stony stare.

    Lou Faber

  • FREEDOM

    He took copious notes until he knew without doubt of the proper progression. He double checked to insure he missed nothing. When he was certain he set out and disappeared over the horizon.

    Lou Faber

  • FLORIDA, JANUARY (2 HAIKU & A TANKA)

    In southern winter odd-shaped and ungainly birds fly in gracefully. The egret peers in and we peer right back at him Florida morning. Alligator lies still in the afternoon sun ignoring the birds and just imagines himself lying in the mid-day sun.

    Lou Faber