an old writer and his words

  • TO A FATHER, NEVER KNOWN

    You were to be my prophetand you played Jonah one morningby clutching your chest at the sinkand dropping to the floor, dead.You left me to wanderthrough Ninevah, a beggartwice robbed of originground pulled from beneath my feet.Why did you flee your taskthe one for which you were anointed.Couldn’t you see our home laid ruinconsumed by…

    Lou Faber

  • AND TODAY?

    He walks with what he considers a swagger. He will gladly stare you in the eye, and you will look away. He prides himself on constancy, knowing you will arrive each day, knowing you will bring nothing in response to his request. He’ll turn his back on you and ignore you once again. Then he…

    Lou Faber

  • BLESSING

    There is a blessing in silence that we so often deny ourselves, unaware that it lies just beyond the noise of our minds and lives. We crave it, beg for it, and hearing the beggar, shun him for the noise he carries like the skin he cannot molt. Beethoven understood silence in his later years…

    Lou Faber

  • RINZAI’S TITLELESS MAN 鐵笛倒吹 語十七

    If you come upon both beggar and nobleman see neither wealth or poverty, smell neither the fine rosewater or the crying need of a bath, hear neither the ravings of one or the philosophy of the other, taste neither the fine curry of the moldy bread crust, feel neither the tattered rag or the purest…

    Lou Faber

  • HOJU TURNS HIS BACK 鐵笛倒吹 七十二

    If a beggar approaches do you turn away from him. If a rich man calls to you, do you receive him openly. How do you tell them apart? If a poor thief in fine, stolen silks stands before you what do you offer in welcome, and what for his battered victim now wearing the thief’s…

    Lou Faber

  • BEGGAR’S TALE

    I speak clearly, concisely in an ancient, long forgotten tongue that none understand. I tell my tale, leaving out nothing, a summoner in a deaf world, whispering of coins, pulled from an empty pocket and cast at your feet, soundless. I point to signs, lettered in my careful hand, without meaning, cryptic to you You…

    Lou Faber