Relationships – Page 24 – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Category: Relationships

For C.A. Wiles

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry, Relationships / tagged Connections, Death, Shakespeare / May 9, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

As I was saying to C.A. the other day

Well actually I wasn’t
but wished I would have been
If I had known he was dying any day

I would have said
You are my twice removed
and now about to be removed
connection to Buffalo Bill
where your father worked
the Wild West Show

I made note of it
in a poem
you might recall

And I would have said
I want you to know I am as proud
to have shaken your hand as his

And I would have said
You are a prince among men
and among princes

For, though Shakespeare
may not have foretold it
there may be as many
in Texas as in Denmark

I would have said all that
or met and not said it at all

And yet C.A.
if you and I should meet
some ghost-lit night

as you step down
from your ghost rider rounds
to ponder your own
sweet moon-blanched skull
as a princely poet just might do

I would say I’m sure along with you
and every poet here

Alas poor Yorick
we did not know you well
we did not know you well enough

Image of Buffalo Bill Coin by WilliPuschel

Transmittal

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Connections, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Mum, Royal Family, United Nations, Winston Churchill / May 8, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

They talk about degrees of separation

With apologies to Kevin Bacon
I like to think in degrees of connection

When I helped Madeleine Albright
down from that one tricky step
it was also everyone at the UN
and anyone who was anyone
in politics and power for thirty years

President Ford was a nice man
with a football player’s hand
that had shaken more than a few

When the Queen Mother in her 90s
was our guest in the Saskatchewan Hotel
I held her hand in both of mine a little
longer than called for in the book of protocol
wanting to make sure that Churchill got through

Degrees of Separation

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Connections, Fame, Royalty / May 7, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

C.A. tells me the other day
about his genuine cowboy father
who worked Wild Bill’s “Wild West” show

And if I shake C.A.’s hand and I often do
I’m only one away from Buffalo Bill
and Sitting Bull makes two

And then there’s Black Elk and Crazy Horse
and a whole passel of Little Big Horn Sioux

And shaking the hand of the Queen Mom
and loving her lots and holding on some
I was only one away from Churchill
and every crowned head for a hundred years
and Lady Di too, don’t that bring some tears

And I also hug Greta now and then
who worked for Hammarsjold at the U.N.

Yesterday I had a rum with Eric
who lived with the Yanamami
and natives of a Southern sea

All those amazing thousands
and I still haven’t counted past three
anyone here want to shake hands with me

How The Ear and The Eye

Audio Recordings, Nature, Relationships / tagged Communication / May 2, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

How the ear and the eye
both sender and receiver be

How like the sun
you warm all that you softly see

And do not think
dear hammer anvil ear
that little drum plays but for thee

Cowboys Will Be Boys

Audio Recordings, Cattle, Cowboy Poetry, Cows, Farm, Ranch Life, Relationships / April 30, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

How funny is it
to be kicked by a cow
(at least compared to a horse)

Depends a lot
if it happens to you
or to your tightest friend

(By tight I mean
both close and liquored up)

Just one of those jokes
that girls don’t seem to get
not even in the calving pen

At least I’ve never seen
them doing their damndest
to get the one with broken ribs
to laugh so they can see them cry

1 Reply

Leave Some Fairies in the Fairy Tales

Audio Recordings, Relationships / April 22, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

It takes the romance
out of the Cinderella story to say
the prince booted her like a car on a curb

and is dropping a shoe entrapment too

As for the Sprats, wife and Jack
can we quit all fad-diet benefits chat
They were happy, let's leave it like that

A boot is a large, heavy metal device that clamps onto one of the wheels of a vehicle with the intent of preventing the vehicle from driving away

Tempis

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry, Relationships / tagged Art & Artists, Time Flies / April 21, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

In the caves there are paintings
thirty thousand years old
and the Sistine Chapel has been
around for a while

In Tibet and Arizona
they paint with colored sand
a Cordon Bleu feast, beautiful
for a moment then brushed away

For those who would judge
one as better than the other
I offer a poem or a psalm
in a long-remembered book

Reading it is in column one
hearing it in column two

Or how about a whispered
I love you in the ear
is it gone ... or is it here

Magdalene

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Christ, Hope, Love, Rebirth, resurrection / April 10, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Mary Magdalene lay down
with the sons of man
And knew them as sons of God
There was no sin in Magdalene
for she saw no sin in them
Dearest of all to the carpenter's son
was the one who could see him most clear
For there was no sin in Magdalene
and she saw no sin in him — It is storied that Mary Magdalene was the first person Jesus appeared to after his resurrection.

The Twinkle

Audio Recordings, Family, Relationships / tagged Joy, Light / March 31, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

There is a thing about light
no matter where it starts
it never stops

Even if it takes a million years
to get from the twinkling stars
to here

There was a twinkle in the eyes of this man
A twinkle of innocent mischief and inner joy
greeting every man and woman
every girl and boy

When you saw it you knew that he liked you
and never doubted that you’d like him too

And he was right

Because there is a thing about light

A million years from now
and no one knows how far
they will see it on some star

A poem composed for the author’s father’s funeral in 1997

Copper Left Her Laugh

Audio Recordings, Relationships, Remembering / tagged Death, Joy, Memory / March 29, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

It is on
her answering machine
It is in
the hearts
of a thousand friends
as she laughs at death
or with it

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