Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Tag Archives: Childhood

Mossbank II

Audio Recordings / tagged Childhood, Learning, Music, Noise, Practice / March 24, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Valve trombone and trumpet
Ernie and me
poisoning the air with practice

Tabula Rasa on the Ranch

Audio Recordings, Farm, Nature, Nostalgia, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Childhood, Dogs, Solitude / February 6, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Bee thinking about
what I might have been thinking about
on those long walks, just me and the dog
and coming to the conclusion - nothing much

The dog had her nose to follow
and she older and wiser than my four or five
more likely I just followed where it took her

A covey of partridge might explode in our face
a killdeer fake hurt to mislead us from her nest
or gophers barely beat us in a race to their hole

Even though I don't remember what there was
the secret of the joy might have been what wasn't
and what there wasn't in all those acres was people

With people you had to use your wits and words
and about a hundred million ways to get it wrong

Just me and the dog it was nothing but song

Halloweens in Dreams

Audio Recordings / tagged Childhood, Fear, Halloween, Horror, Stories / October 31, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Let's have a party this year
after all the trick-or-treaters
have gone home to rot their teeth
and look like this year's pumpkins

We'll sit around the light
of the candles last flickerings
and share scariest childhood dreams

I'll bring the big brown bear
that chased me every night
to the mouth of an open well
where I fell all the way to waking

And you can try to top or bottom that

Fair Ball

Audio Recordings, Family, Relationships / tagged Baseball, Childhood, Sport, Support / September 16, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

So what if my father
only came out once
to watch me play baseball

He was a busy man

I caught a hard line drive

Old Ranch Physics

Audio Recordings, Farm, Nostalgia, Ranch Life / tagged Childhood, Play, Science / August 4, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Centrifugal force
is a gopher circling
on a binder twine noose

A cinch breaking
on a quarter-horse turning
and how far from the horse you fall

A quarter spinning
in the big bread-mixing bowl
and the up and down whoosh of the whine

A Funny Story

Audio Recordings, Family, Remembering / tagged Childhood, Humor / July 21, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

In the dream I say to brother Wally

You're going to have to tell the story
of the milk I drank way back then
is going to come out my nose again

Why the Collectors Aren’t Collecting My Comic Book Collection

Audio Recordings, Family, Nostalgia / tagged Boys, Childhood, Siblings / July 19, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Peanut butter
bacon, candy and mud

roll em up fold em up
lug them everywhere love

and brothers

Lifebuoy

Audio Recordings, Family, Ranch Life / tagged Childhood / July 18, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

I have never learned to swear very well
which just goes to show that training will tell

That there is much to be said for good homes
and payoffs for stern discipline and hope

It's not that I don't know the words
but they all still taste like soap

Teacher (In Defence of Schoolboy Crushes)

Audio Recordings, Relationships, Remembering / tagged Childhood, Education / June 21, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

She was my teacher in grade four
I fell in love for evermore

Not a love I could express
though with schoolwork might impress

And so I spent my nights and days
in search of learning and of praise

A flower opening to the light
in aching anguish and delight

Then she went and moved away
It seemed life ended on that day

Though looking back on that great year
not dimmed by time but made more clear

I see that ancient youthful yearning
remains of love of love and learning

Aunty High Over

Audio Recordings, Nostalgia, Remembering / tagged Childhood, Education, Fun, Games / June 19, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

You need a ball is all

and a schoolhouse
small enough to throw it over

There is the calling out
and then the throwing over
and the catching and the tagging
and the laughing, always the laughing

There were rules, you could look them up
they were too small a part to mention here

The one room schoolhouse north of Courval, Saskatchewan
attended by the author’s father and the author as well

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Ken on MossbankMarch 23, 2025
Beautiful, that could go on a t-shirt
Nancy Fierstien on TroubledMarch 18, 2025
Keep writing, Neil. Keep writing and writing and writing…because you have so much tucked inside that is worth saying to…
Ken Christopher on Negative Space in New York CityMarch 17, 2025
Prairie boy in NYC
Anonymous on Cowboys Will Be BoysMarch 6, 2025
I love this poem make more like it
Nancy Fierstien on Redwoods in the RainFebruary 27, 2025
Love, love, love, love, love this one Neil!

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