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
Author Archives: neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com
BEMUSED
BEMUSED
It is never wise to be
at all ungrateful to your muse
Through 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
TREE PLANTER POET
TREE PLANTER POET
The tree planter 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
Understanding the Feminine
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
A Poem Before Holland
A POEM BEFORE HOLLAND
I travel to Holland
on wings of a childhood story
silver skates and finger in a dike
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 dike 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
WORTH OF A MAN
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
SAYINGS FROM OLD RANCH KITCHEN
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
A BOAT CALLED TRUTH
A BOAT CALLED TRUTH
We have known and loved each other
deeply all these years
Each one or both always honouring some
relationship with someone else
So we never quite say it
and we never quite do it
One sunny day in Santa Barbara harbour
we see the name “TRUTH” on a pretty boat
We take each other’s pictures by the stern
but we never get on the boat
THE MIDAS TOUCH
KING MIDAS
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
LULLABY TO POLARITY
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