an old writer and his words

  • AUTHORSHIP

    If birds could write, which birdwould write like which author.The Osprey would clearly be Hemingwayknowing the sea, but with no need for an old man.The common Gallinule might becomeBilly Collins, an easy laugh and always entertaining.The crows could be so many writersattending workshops, all still lookingfor a voice to express themselves withoutcausing their audience to…

    Lou Faber

  • EPITAPH FOR ANOTHER DAY

    When I write the storyof my life, it will not beme standing by the seastaff in hand, waitingfor the waters to part.It will be sand, endlessseas of sand, piledaround my feet.I will not recount ten plaguesfor there is only onethat matters at alland it was notterribly exciting,no generation perished,we weren’t overrunwith frogs or verminsave the…

    Lou Faber

  • SHE

    You were a young beautyto my middle aged eyesthat knew, despite the mirror’slies, that I too retainedsome large measure of youth. Even that is now behind us,and I can no longer denythe mirror’s sad truth,my face unable to belie whatI knew time had wrought. And yet your beauty hasnot diminished, rather grownas does a fine…

    Lou Faber

  • GANTO’S SIT STILL

    How can I bringthree worlds together?Sitting still,deep in silence,I can carry the mountainto the shore,where the sea,land and skymerge in perfectharmony. A reflection on case 75 of the Shobogenzo (True Dharma Eye) Koans

    Lou Faber

  • WRONG AGAIN

    As a teenager, like somany others of our narrowminded, obsessed gender,I imagined myself a great lothario,girls on the edge of womanhoodlining up for my attention. The absurdity of that dreamwas lost on me and my peers,testosterone drowning it in a seaof hormones, and we were obliviousto the real obstacle alwaysright in front of us, that…

    Lou Faber

  • STRING QUARTET

    The violinists’ laughter and tearsare flung from her flying bow,drip from his elbow,and wash over the stilled audience –we can taste the seaas we threaten to capsize. The viola is the older brothernow steadying, now caughtin the wave, ridingits dizzying course,dragging us in its wake. The cello is a torso, the cellista surgeon, her handsplucking…

    Lou Faber

  • DROWNING

    Stop and breathe, deeply,don’t look at the smog,at the particles hangingin your air like a curtain. Don’t pause to considerwhat you are inhaling, don’tpicture your alveoli cloggedwith what you can now see. You are drowning slowly ina sea of air, so imagine yourselfa fish struggling in the waterof a sea you have laid waste to.

    Lou Faber

  • DEEP

    Deep beneath the Arctic icethe whale songs shimmerin the harsh lightof a frozen sun.We strive to hear them,hear nothing, hear onlyour thoughts echoingthrough cavernous memories.With thoughts of what was,what we wish had been,we are ambient noisein a universe whichcradles hope, craves silence.Dolphins dream of dayswhen the sea was theirs,lives lived in a slow paradisea world…

    Lou Faber

  • THE WAVES

    We, so far out at sea,see only the waves passing,the rise and fall, the rhythm,and cannot imagineit could be otherwise, You, on the shorecannot perceive the waveswe do, torn by the reefthat leaves you onlyimagining what you thinkthe waves might be. We cannot imaginethe silence, the isolationyou must feel in yourwaveless world withonly memory of…

    Lou Faber

  • SOTO

    If you are able to speakmaintain silence,If you can bear the silence,listen to the song the sea sings.If you can sing with the seacount the grains of sandthat wash in on the next wave.If you lose count, begin againbefore the wave recedes.If the wave recedes beforeyou finish counting, bid it farewell.After you bid farewellreturn to…

    Lou Faber