Poems about Poetry – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Category: Poems about Poetry

Heat Wave Haiku

Audio Recordings, Environment, Haiku, Nature, Poems about Poetry / tagged Summer / July 28, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

In weather not fit
for man or doggerel
put down pen lift drink

Why Not the Beautiful Words

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / tagged Choice, Language / July 27, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Why don't we use just the beautiful words
Why not cast out a net and bring
back only those that sing

Why would we use the English for butterfly
doesn't that sound like a dairy related event

Why use the German Schmetterling
doesn't that have a schledgehammer ring

Wouldn't Italina farfalla, Spanish mariposa or the Porguguese borboleta be betta

Why not the très French papillon
does it not taste n the tongue to you
like air and nectar and dew

Why don't we save bats for hitting balls
and for insulation for our house
would it not be more fitting
to flit with the fledermaus

Are there not a thousand languages or more
do they not all hold jewels in their core

Why not let the children choose

Are their hearts not our purest tuning forks
are they not ourselves more clear
do they not still resonate with all
they speak and feel and hear

Tuning Forks

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / tagged Creativity, Inspiration / July 26, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

When life and writing have
fallen into earth-filled holes

When bootstraps pulling up
need someone else to pull them

Stafford or Rumi or Noal wait
a reading away from music again

Humming with Neruda or Oliver or Hafiz
mud falls from booths and stars come out

Poet All Stars

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / tagged Comparison, Competition, Excellence, Literature, Perseverence, Sports / July 18, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

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 Khayyam
Wordsworth, Shakespeare (or whoever wrote his stuff)

It's like always batting against Nolan Ryan on his best day
Like trying to strike out 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 wiht their best stuff

Soccer players today don't have to play Pelé every day
But with translations and free agents
we write up against Neruda, Viello and Paz

Or heads up against Leo Tolstoy and Anna Ackmanova
with an East German judge

But we play

The Little Dutch Boy Writes Poetry

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry, String Too Short To Save / July 17, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Only a drop of two
and only from time to time
but you can feel the weight
of the whole North Sea behind it

Father’s Poem

Audio Recordings, Family, Poems about Poetry, Relationships / tagged Care, Comfort, Death, Grief, Loss, Nurturing / June 24, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

My father's poems
did not come down to us on paper

He was eight years old when his mother died
his youngest brother not yet three

They say he adopted the care
of the sweet sad child
and told him a story each night

Night after night after night
new stories he made up each night

And he would gather him up in the story
and hold him there
until he slept

A Prairie Villanelle

Audio Recordings, Farm, Nostalgia, Poems about Poetry, Ranch Life, Relationships, Remembering, Travel / June 11, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

If prairie wheels again had I
I'd chew the gravel and the air
with prairie roads to fly

I'd plume the earth into the sky
to show them I was there
if prairie wheels again had I

Past places where dead neighbours lie
I'd not linger who would dare
with prairie roads to fly

Dust to dust gets in your eye
I'd look for other things to share
if prairie wheels again had I

Then greener farmyards I'd pass by
in mem-mirages free of care
with prairie roads to fly

I'd roll past all that makes you cry
afloat in sunsets clear and fair
if prairie wheels again had I
with prairie roads to fly

What the Hell Villanelle

Poems about Poetry / June 10, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

I thought, oh what the hell
since everything is but a dance
I'll just write a villanelle

Though I may not ronde half so well
as the spinning peasants of old France
I thought, oh what the hell

Left footed stories I can tell
though you might laugh I'll take a chance
I'll just write a villanelle

Though it may not cast young Dylan's spell
around his father's fierce-teared glance
I thought, oh what the hell

Though it may not a million copies sell
it may win your love perchance
I'll just write a villanelle

It may not toll Gray's churchyard knell
others have failed in that romance
I thought, oh what the hell
I'll just write a villanelle

Photo by Federica Giusti on Unsplash

1 Reply

Judy

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry, Relationships / tagged Death, Grief, Jealousy, Regret, Suicide / June 1, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Judy was a beauty
tall and blonde and shy
early this month she decided to die

The soft wise eyes, the curling lashes
all now ashes

We have been friends for twenty years
hugs and coffee when in town, cards when far away

And always the latest poetry

She said it was important, and it touched her
in places nothing and no one else could reach

Three years ago
I put my neck in a green-eyed noose

I sent no cards, I did not call

I do not know if I could have saved her
though touch and poetry have been known to

I only know I hate what I did and didn't do
I only know that she drowned out there alone
I only know it was a long time since I had thrown her a line

1 Reply

Wisdom

Audio Recordings, Personal Growth, Poems about Poetry, Relationships / May 17, 2026 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

I met a man I had not met
for fifty years or maybe more

Neither I nor the man I met
were the man we'd been before

I had never met the wise man
He had never met the poet

For Archbishop James Weisgerber; aka Father Jim during years at Athol Murray’s Notre Dame College Photo: Holy Rosary Cathedral – Regina, Saskatchewan

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Sandi Hebley on The Man in the Desert RemembersJuly 21, 2026
Wow!
JM on The Man in the Desert RemembersJuly 21, 2026
This one really hit home Thank you
Judy Migel on TearsJuly 20, 2026
Dorsey is right. It is even more beautiful to hear the words in your voice and all the emotion in…
Eda Lishman on Lost at SeaJuly 16, 2026
Oh, Neil: This reflection sure hits the times we are a-living. Each day and night those of us who are…
Sandi Hebley on Eagle Bone WhistleJuly 6, 2026
Beautiful!!

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