2000

POEMS

A.     Neil Meili

Copyright 2001

For

P.J. and the Pantry

and all the poets in Austin

feeding the hungry in so many ways

The taboo

on cannibalism

Is only the most obvious

of a great number of laws

Designed to protect

the lawmakers from the hungry

CONTENTS

Marhesha’s Dream

Candle Lake 2000

Pelican Project

Pelican Poem

Pelican Salute

Robin Haiku

Robin

Thirsty

Reminders

Reluctant She Rises

Houston

A Guy Thing

Venus Unearthed

Haiku or Less

Emily Dickinson

Anna Ackmanova

Biblical

Lullaby To Polarity

Midas

A Boat Called Truth

Sayings From Old Ranch Kitchen

Worth of a Man

Understanding the Feminine

Tree Planter Poetry

Bemused

Wind and Rain

Again

Beyond the Stars

Barn Swallows

Frost Bite

Poem Before Holland

Poetry All Stars

MARHESHA’S DREAM

She opens a door

into a huge domed stadium filled with men

woman and children in costumes of all ages

She knows that they are all there for her

to set up any drama at any time

to learn any lesson she needs to learn

She closes the door

and walks down the corridor

Another door to a storage closet

Inside big barrels labeled

“plot thickener”

CANDLE LAKE 2000

Five in the morning

Wind shakes northern cabin

rain rattles roof and window

Plaintive loons cry and try

to lift the hidden sun

THE PELICAN

PROJECT

In July 2000, New Dance Horizons in Regina

Saskatchewan put together a presentation for

“Dance and The Child International”

It consisted of dance song and poetry,

performed by about thirty young people,

many from Canada’s “First Nations”

I had the privilege of coaching and guiding

them as they wrote their own poems

Following are some poems that I wrote

for samples of metaphor, and for the awe and

respect I felt for their talent and their courage

Also, I was totally star struck by the grace and

beauty of Robin, the director and dance

instructor who goes around quoting Neruda

and holds my disowned love of movement

so wrote poems for and about her as well

I AM PELICAN

I have flown over the dinosaurs dying

through the ash of the meteors crashing

I have swam in the ice floes melting

I have eaten the first fish walking

I have felt the poles a shifting

in the magnets in my head

I have seen the white man and the red

I have seen the old wives dead

I have felt the pull of the settlers need

and tasted the poisons of their greed

I have heard the earth a groaning

I have felt the earth in pain

I have seen the Rainbow Warriors

dance the vision back again

And I fly and swim and wait

and pray they’re not too late

PELICAN PROJECT SALUTE

You are the pelican warriors

You are the pelicans who do not run away

you are the pelicans that stay and fight

you are the pelicans that defend your nests

you are the pelicans that defend your tribe

You are the pelicans

who fly from your homes to find a new lake

You are the pelicans

brave enough to fly near people

( it can be dangerous to fly near people )

You are the pelicans

brave enough to fly through your fears

You are the pelicans

who know some people are your friends

who know some people need your gifts

You are the pelicans

who teach pelicans and people

how to care for their young

how to live for their tribe

How to fly and dance and swim

and fish together again

I dip my ink tipped wing

in praise of you

A HAIKU FOR ROBIN

A pearl dropped in water

her body sends ripples

through air

ROBIN

Robin is a pelican

she flies with perfect grace

swims with perfect grace

moves with perfect grace

Pelicans swim with Robin as a sister

pelicans are very old and wise

they know a pelican

can be a beautiful woman

Humans are not so wise

but there is a way to know

if a beautiful woman is a pelican

Robin is a pelican

when she opens to fee you

you can taste her heart

THIRSTY IT LAPS

The sea

like man is filled with salt

and must drink fresh water to live

Thirsty it laps

it’s great tongue on the shore

to widen the gates of the rivers

REMINDERS

Sometimes my body has to remind my mind

yes sometimes my body has to remind my mind

Remember her touch and the times out of mind

and the times out of mind

Remember the tastes and the times out of mind

and all the treasures that we both would find

in those times out of mind

all those times out of mind

And the mind, being mind, says

never mind never mind never mind

And the body says

never mind, mind, you never mind

never you never you mind me

never you never you mind me

All my great pleasures you’ve again undermined

and you don’t think I mind no you don’t think I mind

And it’s easy for anyone half blind to see

you’re lonely as hell and depressed as can be

Pouring chocolate and booze and sugar in me

And we’d be both better off if you’d only mind me

we’d be both better off if you’d only to mind me

RELUCTANT SHE RISES

Reluctant she rises from morning love

The voice of a million things to do

Argues with the voice

of the perfect moment

Slowly concedes

and falls back

into a purr

YOU ARE THE U IN HOUSTON TO ME

How could I ever leave you love

if you didn’t live in Houston

If it wasn’t for the humid swamp

and the trash along the bayou

how could I say good-bye to you

You know I love you dearly

and it aint you the makes me run

but Houston traffic’s far from fun

and every Bubba’s got a gun

Yet even with all of that

and the country’s worst damn air

you know that I’ll keep coming back

as long as you are there

And I’ll keep leaving Houston too

after a muggy smoggy day or two

One of these days I hope you know

I’ll take you with me when I go

IT’S A GUY THING

Narcissus stared into the water till he died

locked into the image of his pride

Trying to embrace it made it fly

teardrops spoiled it if he’d cry

No thirst would make him think

to spoil it with his lips to drink

Self love was not the nymphs dire curse

but love of image which is much much worse

VENUS UNEARTHED BY THE CHRISTMAS

At first they sermonized her some

and prayed long over her and around her

And yet she solidly refused to change

In their Christian charity

(It was more rampant then)

they decided not to destroy her

And yet

it was not a good thing for the children

to see her touching herself in that way

So the arms would have to go

PHOENIX

Cactus on horizon

hands up in surrender to the sun

COURVAL

Small town smaller

reference points gone

inside compass wobbles

MOSSBANK

Chinese café

big – small – happy

three symbols for me

MOSSBANK II

Valve trombone and trumpet

Ernie and I

poisoning the air with practice

OUTSIDE WALLY

AND LEA’S WINDOW

Noble futility

small fountain

standing in the rain

PRAIRIE BUMPER STICKER

I brake for trains

that don’t run anymore

CALIFORNIA HWY. #1

Pacific coasts by

LAKE LOUISE TO JASPER

Poet struck dumb

by the folly of throwing

a word against a mountain

EMILY

Again it is two a.m.

and I am Emily Dickinson

Deep in my books and solitude

Answering the small great questions

How am I

What kind of a day has it been

Notes from a shut-ins bed

to friends a hundred years dead

ANNA

Could a drop of blood

from the pen of Anna Akhmatova

enter my blood

that I might write with a deeper red

A husband falls to the firing squad

a some in prison for no greater crime

than carrying his father’s name

Seventeen months at Leningrad prison

she waits in line each day for word of life

mid screams of those who learn of death

She has been a poet for thirty years and more

woman in line asks, “can you describe this”

she becomes a poet now

BIBLICAL

I would like to know you biblically

With all the power and passion

of the old testament

All the love and forgiveness

of the new

LULLABY TO POLARITY

The more the more you are woman

the more I am man

The more you rest soft in my arms

the stronger they become

The more the more I am man

the more you are woman

The more the strength

in the shape of the spoon

The more the more even in sleep

you curl up and melt

into sugar and good medicine

THE MIDAS TOUCH

King Midas wrote poems

in the finest of gold

and gave them to friends

or so I am told

Barred as he was

from touching in any

ordinary way

A BOAT CALLED TRUTH

We have known and loved each other

deeply all these years

Each one or both always honoring some

relationship with someone else

So we never quite say it

and we never quite do it

One sunny day in Santa Barbara harbor

we see the name “TRUTH” on a pretty boat

We take each others pictures by the stern

but we never get on the boat

SAYINGS FROM OLD RANCH KITCHEN

“Clean off your plate

there are starving people in China”

“Take the last food from the bowls

we’ll have a nice day tomorrow”

I never put it together this way

but the people in China

must have always had a nice day

WORTH OF A MAN

In my father’s mind

the worth of any man

was tied hand and foot to his work

The day he retired

to leave his ranch and his work

he was felled by a massive stroke

Every time I make enough money to quit

I hurry to lose it as fast as I can

And go right back to work to make it again

remembering what I learned from this man

UNDERSTANDING THE FEMININE

The moon has a bright side

that we see in the skies

or reflected in water

and eyes

The moon has a dark side

which can never be ours

she uses it only

to commune with the stars

TREE PLANTER POET

The tree planter poet writes a book

She is a knife

sharp as mountain morning

blade steel blue as northern lake

She swings with youthful abandon

cuts through light, shadow, and flesh

We stand white bone to white bone

and bleed into the earth and sky

Ten years later she writes another

Knife cuts dull meat and metaphor

catching only small reflections of light

through comfort of kitchen window

The reader and the blade

yearning for the grindstone

and the trail of sparks

BEMUSED

It is never wise to be

at all ungrateful to your muse

Though the times they pick to bring their gift

are ones few of us would choose

But they do live on a mountain in Greece

while we’re scribbling in Texas at two a.m.

So they’re bright and alert and off to work

because it’s nine in the morning to them

WIND AND RAIN

Does wind linger long in the rain

to quench it’s desert thirst

Or in the day shiver

and hurry to the sunlight

At Night does it eagerly

slip through open windows

To join us under echoing roof

and kiss our skins with

moistened lips

AGAIN

To look out across sunsets and centuries

to see time as nothing - - - love as all

To touch new skins in wonder

and come together again

Under a sky, dark with a million

ancient stars

BEYOND THE STARS

You took me beyond the stars

If you had not held my hand

I would not have had

the courage to go

Or the strength

to return

BARN SWALLOWS

They swoop

from beneath the eaves

Carving

an invitation

to the big red ship

Come slip your moorings

and follow us across the sea

FROST BITE

On the prairies they know

that you have to use snow

In January on the Wood River

the laces got wet and then stiff

and could not be untied

Walked the wimpering long mile home

in one frozen skate and one warm boot

part of my foot and all my toes

numb and milky white

On the prairies they know

that you have to use snow

Too much warmth all at once

can bring the feeling rushing back

with more pain than you can stand

I have since learned

and this is the sad part

It is the same way with the heart

A POEM BEFORE HOLLAND

I travel to Holland

on wings of childhood story

silver skates and finger in a dyke

To lands wrestled from an angry sea

a sea that dearly wants them back

Unceasing vigilance to keep the prize

a dark line drawn across their eyes

I see windmills chop the salt wet air

Art and flowers leaping up in faith

behind thin walls

Back to the little boy and the dyke again

legal drugs and red lights in the rain

These are a fair and sturdy people

I like them now, and I like how

In a land where children must

so often act as men

They do not pass acts that treat

their men as children

POET ALL STARS

The odds are overwhelming

Every time we play the game

we find ourselves on a level field

with the all time all world all star team

Homer, Whitman, Rumi and Omar Khayam

Wordsworth, Shakespeare, or whoever

wrote his stuff

It’s like always batting against Nolan Ryan on

his best day

Like trying to strike our Mickey Mantle, Ted

Williams, Babe Ruth without a hangover

and Reggie Jackson in October

Great poets never tire or retire, they just die

and still play with their best stuff

Soccer players today don’t have to play Pele

every day,

But with translations and free agents

we write against Neruda, Viello, and Pez

Or heads up against Leo Tolstoy and Anna

Ackmanova

with an East German Judge

But we play

Back cover quote:

“Still trying to become

the person who writes my best poems”

Dean Blehart

NEW TEXAS PRESS

AUSTIN, TEXAS