an old writer and his words

  • AFLOAT

    I have taken tofolding my poemsinto little paper boatsand dropping gentlyinto the riverwhere they saildownstream. Many may drownbut some mayreach the lakeor be plucked outand reador discarded. The river is,in the end,my harshestcritic.

    Lou Faber

  • WANTING

    I wanted to write like Heaneybut of course he got there firstand could do it in two languages,so that was out of the question. I tried to write like otherof the greats only to find thatwhat set them apart from so manyset them rather far apart from me. So I an left to write as…

    Lou Faber

  • LISTING

    I suppose I shouldmake a list of the thingsI don’t very much like. I’m an optimist so the listwon’t be all that long, thoughit grows the more I think about it. I was going to putmy ex-wife on the listbut she doesn’t like meand I have no feelingsfor her either way. So it’s down toautocrats…

    Lou Faber

  • BUT

    On more than one occasionsomeone has come up to meafter an open mic readingto tell me that they love my work. I am honored and tell them sobut curious as well, since Ionly read two poems, whichhardly counts as my work. I offer to sell them my bookat a substantial discount,but they inevitably tell me“Thanks,…

    Lou Faber

  • A SIMPLE TASK

    You misunderstand me, he said,I did not ask you to write a poemabout a flower, anyone can do that,I asked you to write a poem with a flower. Do not ask me what the poemwill be about, ask the flower, butfirst you must learn to speakthe language of the flowers. If you find this difficult,…

    Lou Faber

  • THIS POEM

    This poem beginswith infinitepossibility First Published in the 2005 Scars Publications Poetry Wall Calendar

    Lou Faber

  • WE ARE SORRY, BUT

    I will take it,the aging poet saidto the ever more sparsecrowd at the weeklyopen mic,as a recognitionis the growthin the qualityof my writingthat I continuebeing rejectedbut now by amuch higherquality ofliterary journals.

    Lou Faber

  • A VISION

    He loved the simple irony of it all. His vision was failing in one eye, likely might in the other, from macular degeneration. There was a hole in his vision thanks to his macula and geographic atrophy. And being a man of words he knew the best way to describe that spot, that hole, was…

    Lou Faber

  • WORKSHOP

    Grace settles into the chair,less an act of sitting thanof floating down onto the seat.She has borrowed my grandmother’ssmile, kind, gentle, inviting.She pulls a book from her bag,its pages or most of themdog eared, and I glimpsesome annotations in the margins.We sit around her like childrenawaiting presents on a holiday,as acolytes seeking knowledgefrom a font…

    Lou Faber

  • DEMANDED TIME

    I’ve made a practicewhich feels more like a demand,that each day I take a fewmoments or more and stopwhatever else I was, orshould have been, doingto write a poem. There are days, perhaps thisone where it seems morea short bit of prose to whichI have added line breaksdespite the protestof the words, condemning themto bear…

    Lou Faber