an old writer and his words

  • LIFE, ABBREVIATION

    Arrival noted, 11:30 P.M.delivery normal, babyprepared for agency, motherreleased in two days, babyto foster care, thento adoptive parents. No memories, save one,a fall, bathroom, headbleeding, black and whitefloor tile, radiator harderthan child’s skull. Now 70, the same person,a lying mirror each day,a small cemetery, WestVirginia, a headstonea mother finally,a life of mourning.

    Lou Faber

  • LOOKING UP

    I have discovereda small advantageof slowly losingmy sight. Each daythe imagein the mirroris less clear, wrinklesdisappearand I don’tlook quite as old as I knowthat I am, andyou’re lookingbetter as well.

    Lou Faber

  • STOIC

    He will do it again tomorrow as he did yesterday and each day before that for as long as he can remember. He would like not to have to do it, but he knows he must, just as he knows the outcome will be almost the same, just the slightest of changes imperceptible from day…

    Lou Faber

  • MIRROR MIRROR

    The person I see each morninglooks vaguely familiar, perhapssomeone I once met in passing,or maybe a distant relative.But he was so much olderso he was difficult to place. I do say hello each morningbut get only a nod, a gesturein response, as if the personis mute, for he smiles backso it is not a silence…

    Lou Faber

  • MAGIC MIRROR ON THE WALL

    The face in the mirror this morningwas not mine, perhaps it wasthat of my grandparents, allI never met, having onlyold and faded pictures that vaguelyresemble the mirror’s face. It might be my parents, bothdead before I found them onlyyearbook pictures and just possiblea vague similarity to the facethat i see in the mirror each day.…

    Lou Faber

  • REAR VIEW MIND

    I spent too much time lookingbackward, looking into the past,looking into the mirrorto frame a dream historyof my desires and fears.He called one morning, lefta message, “Mother died,more details will follow.”A mother his by birth,mine by legal act.I should have felt stunnedanger, I said quietly to myselfhe’s cocky, has issues, and wentabout momentary mourning.That is…

    Lou Faber

  • YEARBOOK REFLECTION

    Knowing that mybiological parents’pictures were somewherein the yearbooksI had before meI thought that Iwould search withoutlooking at the names. No one lookedat all like the meI see in the mirrornor the me I amshocked to seein my own yearbook. Yet finding themby name I quicklyrealized that Iwas their amalgama face neitherwould have recognizedno matter howsmall…

    Lou Faber

  • REISHO’S BRIGHT AND CLEAR

    As you stareinto the mirrorit is your reflectionyou clearly see.As the facein the mirrorstares at youit is its faceit sees reflected.There is one faceand there area thousand faces. A reflection on Case 88 of Dogen’s Shobogenzo (True Dharma Eye) Koans

    Lou Faber

  • LANDING

    She sends us a map showing on which tribe’s land we are now living. This is not something we have thought about, not something we want to think about, for that would demand that we are the usurpers, the horde whose pogrom was ultimately successful, and that is a face that refuse to see in…

    Lou Faber

  • CARNEY BARKER

    You there, walking along the midway come into my tent, for only a dollar I will show you wonders beyond your meager comprehension but this offer is only good for the next fifteen minutes for that is when I start my show, It’s not something you want to miss. I know you’ve seen quarters pulled…

    Lou Faber