May 2024 – Page 2 – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Monthly Archives: May 2024

Windmill Farms

Audio Recordings / May 21, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

How many will it take
to keep this thing in the air

The Dead Are Good Tippers

Audio Recordings / tagged Care, Death, Gratitude / May 19, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The hospice nurse
may change the bed
and think the dead are dead

Hurry home to feed the kids
and mend the things to mend

But if they feel a debt doth pend
she'll find out in the end

Lost at Sea

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Aging, ALS, Alzheimers/Dementia, Cancer, Death, Disease / May 18, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Uncles, aunts, old friends and more
all sinking below the metaphor
on the way to that distant shore

The keel hauling of cancer
Walking Gerhig's plank with ALS

Hanging from the yardarm
of emphysema's choking rope

The lightning stroke of stroke

The sudden iceberg of heart attack

The slow arctic crush of hoary old age
or slowly sailing, deeper and deeper
into Alzheimers' fog-bound banks

There are a though sand ways
to get back to the launching line
Not sure I'm ready to speculate on mine

Aunt Eileen

Audio Recordings, Family, Relationships / tagged Death, Grief / May 17, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The death of my aunt
came when I had been at the sea
and my pores were open

She entered quickly

Dragging shadows of other deaths
aunts, uncles, father, friends

All loud with the clanking
of the chains that still bind

Aurora Borealis

Audio Recordings, Travel / tagged Adventure, Northern Lights, Northt West Passage, Shipwreck, Tragedy / May 16, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

They have found Franklin's ship
a hundred years frozen in ice

Franklin and Franklin's men
cold, hungry and lead-can crazy
blinded by the glare and the glory

Maybe this is how
we should paint the ceilings of the dying

Want to learn more about Franklin’s Voyage to find the Northwest Passage and the fate of his ship? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/12/hms-terror-wreck-found-arctic-nearly-170-years-northwest-passage-attempt

Blue Spruce

Audio Recordings, Family, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Birds, Childhood, Play / May 15, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

It may have been about thirty feet tall
taller when you're small

And on the very top would sit
the great horned owl

If the anti-Christ were to have
and anti-Christmas tree
he could have capped it
as the perfect dark angel

We cowered by the corner of the house
our very blood frozen
prey to his predator eyes

Yet when he flew away
we could snap - as only children can - from fear to play
run to divide the branches
and return once more to the soft-needled floor

One little two little three little Indians in our magic tepee in a land of long ago
and not so far away

With thanks to Al Westnedge for the stunning photograph of the Great Horned Owl.

When Gum Was Wheat

Audio Recordings, Family, Farm, Nostalgia, Ranch Life, Remembering / May 14, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Before gum was in a store
with baseball cards and sugar

you could play hide and seek in wheat
and chew the half-ripe kernals half a day

Nothing to spend, nothing to pay
If you had a sister or a brother you had play

Speechless on the Prairie

Audio Recordings, Ranch Life / tagged Childhood, Clouds / May 13, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Speechless the snowy tissue of clouds passed over, and more came, and speechless they passed also - Mary Oliver

There must have been a time before words that was not before clouds

Maybe laying on my back in a wicker basket buggy
mother fussing over something in the garden

They didn't attach mobiles to buggies in those days
they didn't have to, the clouds never standing still

How Did Mother Smell

Audio Recordings, Family, Ranch Life, Remembering / May 12, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Not counting the colostrum-rich milk
which I will never forget or rememer
clean is the word that comes to mind

Clean with dustpan or diaper in hand
clean at church or clean in a ditch
the woman was clean from head to soul

Questions for the Next Séance

Audio Recordings, Family / tagged Communication, Curiosity, Death, Heaven, Regrets / May 11, 2024 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Dearest Mother;

Sorry to disturb you
in your well deserved bliss,
but here’s a short list
of things that I forgot to ask

And if it isn’t too much trouble
I’d like the answers as detailed as possible

It will be understandable
if you can’t conjure up a voice,
but one rap for yes, and two for no,
on a floating table won’t quite do

However, if you can look up Samuel Morse,
(who may well be bored and available),
he can give you a quick-study course
and I will dust off my old Boy Scout manual

I believe “talk to me” In Morse still becomes:

-/•-/•-••/-•- /— – – –/––•

So, now that we’ve got the hang of it;

– What was the best day of your life
– What was your worst
– Your greatest triumph
– Your greatest disappointment
– What you are happiest that you did
– Saddest that you didn’t

Why exactly did my uncle shoot my dog
Whatever happened to my baseball card collection, with the rookie Mickey Mantle

and what is heaven like

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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!
Neil on Dog YearsFebruary 22, 2025
Thanks Kim, Sometimes the poems seem to know. Sorry for your loss, Neil
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.…

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