November 2023 – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Monthly Archives: November 2023

For Victor

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Aging, Care, Dogs, Love / November 30, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The only trick an old dog can learn
is how to be an old dog

The minimum of turns one has to take
before lying down for that nap

That a bark is as good as a chase
for keeping squirrels off the deck

And that after all these years
of standing up for your standing friends
you've likely earned their kneeling by you now

Little Finnegan’s Wake

Audio Recordings / tagged Death, Determination, Dogs, Heroism, James Joyce, Literature, Loyalty, Tenacity / November 29, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Finnegan’s Wake
is a model of travail over time

It took James Joyce 17 years to write
and might take you that long to read

Finnegan is also the name
of a little Jack Russell Terrier
who went hiking with her master
Rich Moore near Pagosa Springs Colorado

They found them seventy-two days later
on a rugged slope in the San Juan Mountains
Rich leaning dead against a yellow pine
and Finnegan still fiercely standing guard
Neither Finnegan nor Joyce knew how to give up

Click here to read more about Finney’s harrowing journey: https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/exploration-survival/richard-moore-jack-russell-terrier-pagosa-springs/

1 Reply

Ralph

Audio Recordings, Farm, Ranch Life / tagged Dogs / November 28, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Ralph was a lab
and mostly smart as a lab
yet dumb as smart people can be

Examples of dumb...
Leaping on point from the back of a pickup
when a covey of quail had flushed
and skinning his nose on the landing
Putting porcupine on the menu for lunch
and coming home with a mouthful of quills

Example of smart...
Listening to me explain
how when you live on a ranch
forty miles from a vet I'm the vet
and quietly letting me pull them all out

Movies Got It Wrong

Audio Recordings, Cattle, Cows, Farm, Ranch Life / tagged Cowboys, Westerns, Work / November 27, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Most of the real cowboying
was riding off into the sunrise

Saddling up in the first half-light
to get to where the cattle are
while those doggies are still doggy

Do as much with them as you can
before the heat and the heel flies hit
then head your tired horses home

Sunsets ain't for riding into
they're meant for bullshit and beer
leaning on the fence like you earned it

Jim

Audio Recordings, Farm, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Aging, Persepective, Tobacco / November 26, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

First year on the ranch one of the hands was Jim
seventy years old and Methuselah to my twenty-one

Five foot two with always a chew
never walked but ran wherever he went
tractor to truck, house to barn he never slowed down

Now that I've reached his age and passed it
starting to realize what he might have been running from

An Archaeology of Memory

Audio Recordings, Farm, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Aging, Memory / November 25, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Old cowboy in the nursing home
eyes closed
hands moving slow
bunching up and smoothing out
hills lower and higher than the albums show

Gentle that slope for the prairie wool
steepen it a little for the winter sled
push up a mountain for a boy and his dog
lope a meadow for the tall-horsed teen

Back on the ranch again
excavating in the Plasticine

Memory Care

Audio Recordings, Relationships, Remembering / tagged Aging, Alzheimers/Dementia, Care, Love, Memory / November 24, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Will the memories I want to remember
last longer than those I'd like to forget

Will I still remember how to tie my shoes
when I've grown too stiff to reach them

Will you be there to remind me of you
will you kindly tie that shoe

For Paul and Linda Fite

1 Reply

How Not To Be A Turkey On Thanksgiving Day

Audio Recordings, Personal Growth / tagged Gratitude, Thanksgiving / November 23, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

How do you get to Carnegie Hall
Practice Practice Practice

So sip each morn
and even on plentitude

And on the day of gratitude
show up less loud and crude

Where Were You When

Audio Recordings, Farm, News, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Assassination, Death, John Kennedy / November 22, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The story of how John F. Kennedy was killed
still mixes in with the story of how I heard it

Half a sentence tugging at my greasy sleeve
as I rush from the parts store in Moose Jaw

Picking up more on CBC radio in the pickup
heading west at eighty on Highway One

The urgency of the world waiting
for more news on his condition
not greater in a time of harvest
than my father's anxiety
to get the damn thing fixed
and the crop off before it rained

The moment in time when Kennedy
succumbed to his head woulds
in a Dallas hospital
was lost in the sound of the combine

Department Store Blues

Audio Recordings / tagged Humor, Scent, Shopping / November 21, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

I run the long gauntlet
of perfume counter aisles

Reaching men's wear I dare
my first breath
since leaving the street

Take my time picking up
and fondly fondling
warm winter socks

Should I buy two pair or three
two browns and a black
or to blacks and a brown

In no hurry
to begin the return journey
so recently reminded of why
I had been driven here
in the first place

The odor of the old pair

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Ken Christopher on Buddy TrainingFebruary 19, 2025
Yep, tough love
Kimberly Heinrich on Dog YearsFebruary 18, 2025
You could not possibly have known that today was the day that I had to have my beloved dog euthanized.…
Barbara Joy Bruce on FebruaryFebruary 13, 2025
love it! Thanks, Neil!
Ken Christopher on Ancestry . BarnFebruary 7, 2025
You bet; nice one Neil
Barb on Her Mother Sings to VioletsFebruary 2, 2025
💜💓💜

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