an old writer and his words

  • IN MY MOTHER’S HOUSE

    In my mother’s housethe refrigerator was dottedby little plastic fruitand the phone numberof a plumber we had once used,my sisters latest drawingpresaging a careerin health service managementa shopping listand my brother’s report cardshowing exemplary effortbut a weakness in spellingand my upcoming appointmentat the orthodontist. In my housethe refrigerator is dottedwith little wordsfrom Shakespeareand Chaucerand those…

    Lou Faber

  • ALBANY, THURSDAY NIGHT

    It is a cheap moteljust off the highway,across from the mallnow almost empty of cars,a room not much biggerthan a bed, a desk anda small nightstand.The diet cola is sweatingdespite the breezeof the air conditioner,the television flickers.I have left a wake up callhoping I arise beforethe jangle of the phoneknowing I will not.Corso lies on…

    Lou Faber

  • ALBLANY THURSDAY NIGHT

    It is a cheap moteljust off the highway,across from the mallnow almost empty of cars,a room not much biggerthan a bed, a desk anda small nightstand.The diet cola is sweatingdespite the breezeof the air conditioner,the television flickers.I have left a wake up callhoping I arise beforethe jangle of the phone,knowing I will not.Corso lies on…

    Lou Faber

  • THEN, NOW

    It was easier then, so let’sgo there, the spring of 1970,the location is less important,so long as it’s a coffee housewhere those barely old enoughto drink, or barely short of thatage congregate, waiting forsomething to happen or, Iseriously hoped, someone,someone with little hair, butwho carried James Joyce inhis jeans pocket, Portrait ofthe Artist the only…

    Lou Faber

  • POETS GATHER

    One deep and abiding beauty of dreamsis that it is entirely logical forMarina Tsvetaeva to be engagedIn an animated discussion withCorso and Ginsberg where none willacknowledge that the world theywrote and imagined is a total mess. Over in the corner, Mandelstam andReznikoff have agreed that for eternityevery game of chess they play willresult in a…

    Lou Faber

  • WALKING

    Like the Anasazi’s sudden departure from his cliff dwelling I too snuck away, with hardly any trace from a life no longer in clear recollection, only faint images survive, of hours in the City Lights Bookstore reading Corso, Ferlinghetti and Ginsberg, then buying the slim volume “Gasoline” not because it was my greatest desire, but…

    Lou Faber

  • WALKING

    Like the Anasazi’s sudden departure from his cliff dwelling I too snuck away, with hardly any trace from a life no longer in clear recollection, only faint images survive, of hours in the City Lights Bookstore reading Corso, Ferlinghetti and Ginsberg, then buying the slim volume “Gasoline” not because it was my greatest desire, but…

    Lou Faber

  • ANOTHER BAR, THIS ONE TOKYO

    This poem was recently (February 5, 2019) published in the Beatnik Cowboy.  Check them out at: https://beatnikcowboy.com/   “Another,” he said, his knees pressing against the mahogany panels of the old bar, “and keep them coming until I can take no more. There won’t be a last call tonight.” The clatter of caroming billiard balls…

    Lou Faber

  • CITY LIGHTS

    It was a Tuesday in October or a Wednesday in March, hard to say which, but evening. We had taken a cab from the Hyatt Embarcadero or the Fairmont, it didn’t much matter, and sat in the Chinese restaurant on the edge of Chinatown, or a pasta and seafood joint in North Beach, and you…

    Lou Faber

  • TO ALLEN

    Tell me more about death, I said put it into words, that’s your specialty so open your mouth from amid your black jungle of a beard now white, I want a noise, a howl. Why the hell do I hear only silence, I know it’s the sound of one hand clapping, but I demand more…

    Lou Faber