an old writer and his words

  • CELESTIAL AWE

    He says that there isa really good chance thatso much of astronomyis delusion, that allof astronomy is history.Go out in the countrywhere there are nostreetlights and lookat the sky and the multitudeof stars that you see.There are atlases listingthe name or numberof each of them butstop and realize howmany of them nowno longer exist as…

    Lou Faber

  • MULTIPLICATION

    If he thought about it at allhe probably thought himself akinto Johnny Appleseed, casting his seedand being fruitful in every sense,but some might say he was moreAttila, a Hun pillaging where he couldthen moving on, his prizes claimedthe emotional wrappings discarded.Of course we can never know whichfor some secrets unless exposeddo follow you to the…

    Lou Faber

  • ID, NON EST

    What is surprising is its fragility,the cold hard but oh so thin veneerthat is willingly exposed, but alwaysat a nominal distance so that itsshallowness can hide behind the illusion.Even when among its peers, it wantsto inflate for the bigger it appearsthe less frail it seems to thosecasting the passing glance at it.You would not imagine…

    Lou Faber

  • GENSHA COMES TO THE PROVINCE

    When you siton the cushiondo not let your mindcompare this zazento yesterday’s orimagine tomorrow’s.Those are the thoughtsof a fool for yesterdayand tomorrow are,in this moment,only illusions. A reflection on Case 81 of the Book of Equanimity, Shoyoroku 従容錄

    Lou Faber

  • ENDING HERE

    I am still not certainhow I ended up hereon the other side of silencewhere words go to slowly die.It was to be foreveruntil severed cruelly by deathbut neither of us diedin manifest ways, justsmall deaths that over timesevered the bonds that still held,a death-borne parting of sorts.It was never a mistakeor an omission of logic,…

    Lou Faber

  • DONGSHAN’S “WHERE IS THE FAULT?”

    When you look in the mirrordo you see yourself?Is the you in the mirroranother you?If you say it is merelya reflection of youare you a reflection of it?You imagine you are realand the mirror youimagines he is real.Both real, both illusions. A reflection on Case 78 of Dogen’s Shobogenzo Koans (True Dharma Eye) 正法眼蔵

    Lou Faber

  • A DEPARTURE

    The sun is departing, sayingfarewell to a day wecan no longer reclaim, lostto history, to our inaction, inattention.We will try and remember it,cling to moments from it,but we know they are illusionsbest left in a past already departed.The stars will peer throughthe flowing clouds, winkingas if we are to guess their secrets,and soon the moon…

    Lou Faber

  • URBAN DREAMS

    The city crawls beneath youlike so many beasts awakenedin your recent nightmare, skitteringto somewhere you dare not imagine.This is not your city, it could never be,for cities are mere illusions, veneersfor prisons from which few escapeand fewer still are paroled, andyour sentence only ends in your death.Some say cities are beautiful, butyou know they are…

    Lou Faber

  • OUT OF HIDING

    The hidden joy of youth, and itsinevitable disappointment, isin finding that special person.Each time it is the birth of true love,eventually, save in rare circumstances,it is the death of an illusionand the aching pain accompanying the loss. The certainty of youthful emotionis a bondage that is most often inescapable,and there is no desire to leave…

    Lou Faber

  • THE SURANGAMA SCRIPTURE’S NOT SEEING

    It happens every day,when I arise from the cushionand look, I see myself there.If you look, you say you see me as well.It will happen one daythat when I arise from the cushionand look I will not see myself.If you look, you will say you see me,and I will nod in agreement.Each day when I…

    Lou Faber