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THE FINAL SCENE
For far too long he had beena marionette dancing to a tunehe could not hear, always staying silent,lost in a kabuki theater of the absurd.But he had grown tired of performingat their every demand, his life livedperpetually on call, no time truly his.He was drained by them, empty,not that they cared for they knewthe adulation…
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I PLAY THE FOOL
On more than one occasion she had characterized him as a loveable fool fit for a Shakespearean comedy. Of course when she said this he bristled. That was the required response to the characterization, else he willingly adopt the role in perpetuity. But deep within himself he knew there was more truth than perhaps even…
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BOTH AND NEITHER
We are both master and slaveand reverberating between rolescan be exhausting and exhilarating,on occasion both simultaneously.It seems we are always strivingto catch up to technology, that itis outpacing us and that the racemay soon enough be lost.We say that we cannot live withoutthese technologies and while theymay do things faster and more simplythey do so…
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LUNA
Today is your dayand for a few momentsyou will take center stageand he will face intoyour shadow, youwill be all we can see,he struggling to peek outunaccustomed to a lesser role.So often you shied awayfrom his glare, as if hewould consume you,how you would often fleehis approach, returningonly after he had departed.But it was alwaysyour…
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NO AUDITION
It was a roleshe never anticipatednever wanted, leftto her sisters to carrythe genetic line forward.And she spentthe last half-centuryof her lifetrying to forgetthe role she playedand had to abandon.Although she now istwo decades goneon the second Mondayof May I now stopbless her and mourn herfor performing the rolethat brought me into being
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CERTAIN MORNINGS
There are morningswhen I wishI could be the cat,sit in the corner,close my eyes andwatch the worldsuddenly disappear.The cat breaksmy reverie, purringthere is room for oneand this roleis all mine. First appeared in The Flying Dodo, Issue 4, January 2023https://fantasyfantasywave.wixsite.com/my-site/louis-faber-certain-mornings
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STAGED
At the moment of your birthmy son, I grew suddenly older,mortality became a realitythat I could no longer avoid. You could not imagine this,and I doubt others could seebut I knew and the infinitecollapsed inside the event horizon. Your brother came later, butthat death was incremental,a single cut among thousands,a step on a path you…
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FOR A MOMENT
The cat takes her time,carefully considers on which sideshe will flop down so that Ican rub her stomach. She says she allows meto do this so I feel that Ihave some role to playin her life, validation she says. She will kick me withher hind legs when weare done, “call you againin an hour” she…
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ESQUIRE
Even as a young child I imagined being a lawyer was a noble profession, spent Sunday evenings in front of the old Motorola TV watching Perry Mason stride up to the rail, stare into the witness’ eyes, with Paul Drake smiling in the first row. I tried to make my younger brother play Paul but…