October 2025 – Page 2 – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

Skip to content

Home
Contact
Neil’s Books
Poems
Kind Words
A Neil a Day Poems

Monthly Archives: October 2025

Hold My Beer

Audio Recordings / tagged Bravado, Danger, Risk / October 21, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Snow-pack leaping from a cliff

Eagle, not fully fledged
stepping off the edge of the aerie

Red leaf of the maple showing off for the green

The Storm After the Calm

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Conflict, Fighting, Pain, Surprise / October 20, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Douglas Adams writes of an alien ship that hung
in the air much the same way that bricks don't

The roadrunner running out of cliff
and the look just before he drops

The couple that aren't speaking
and what they say
when they do

Of Bears and Love

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Dreams, Fear, Love / October 19, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

You could draw a hundred mile circle
around our Saskatchewan ranch
and not find a bear anywhere

And yet, there was always a bear

Chasing me
chasing me through my dreams
until I fell, always fell, into a well
and awoke still falling

They say, in falling dreams
you die if you hit the bottom before waking

That was when I was four
I don't dream that dream anymore

Yet when I find myself falling in love with tumbling down and down into love
that old bear is still there

And the fear to let go and hit bottom

Claws

Audio Recordings / tagged Danger, Identity, War / October 18, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The claw of the badger is the badger
and of the bear the bear

As weapons of war are war
and the teeth of the trap the trap

Oh tender soul that you are
may you never have to test this truth

Bone Density

Audio Recordings, Farm, Personal Growth, Ranch Life / tagged Healing, Horses, Injury, Pain, Survival / October 17, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Tamped into tensile strength
by a clunk-hoofed pinto
through leg, saddle and spine
to a headache in a Stetson hat

Hardened by the semi
permafrost of prairie winter

Flexible as knowing
drought and rain and pain
that have come and gone
and might come back again

A Shadow of My Farmer Self

Audio Recordings, Cattle, Farm, Poems about Poetry, Ranch Life / tagged Work / October 16, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The one
who got up with the summer sun
and toiled till the work was done
is done

The one
who would’ve slept the winter away
if it wasn’t for critters hungry ways
now versifies on his clock
with Seamus Heaney’s squat pen
resting between finger and thumb
instead of a three-tined pitchfork
raising blisters in the hot, hot sun

Credit: Seamus Heaney; DIGGING https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47555/digging

Fun in the Kitchen

Audio Recordings, Family, Nostalgia, Poems about Poetry / tagged Feeding, Generosity / October 15, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The joy
I get putting
a poem on your plate

My mother got
three times a day
and fed more by it

Author’s parents in the new ranch kitchen

Enough Already

Audio Recordings, Family / tagged Dining, Feast, Language, Satisfaction, Sayings / October 14, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Pushing back from table
Dad would pronounce his
sufficiency as suffonsified

One of his colorisms
like the mechanical catch-all
Where the spindlededominom
spins around the hootenanny shaft

Never found
an application for the second
but still much wisdom in the first

Gratitude Junkie

Audio Recordings, Family, Travel / tagged Feast, Gathering, Thanksgiving / October 13, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Turkeys are not a migratory bird
but they'll be there when you get there

As long as it's after mid-October
and drumsticks and pumpkin pie
with the apples of my Canadian eye

And before the third week in November
where American friends have a table set
for my second thanksgiving of the year

Who wouldn't be doubly grateful for that

The Gift Horse

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / tagged Acceptance, Generosity, Gratitude, suspicion / October 12, 2025 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

It is not so simple

If you question every action
you will find forces pull in other directions

If you look in the mouth of the horse
not all teeth will be straight
and many may have been grinding for some time

It is more likely
that happiness will be found
by looking deep in the mouth of the adage

Post navigation

← Older posts

Newer posts →

Search

Neil’s Latest Book Available in Paperback and Large Print Edition though Amazon worldwide

Social

View zencowboypoet’s profile on Facebook
View @meilineil’s profile on Twitter
View neilmeili’s profile on Instagram

Want More Poetry? Sign Up Here.

Nancy Fierstien on Eyes of FriendsNovember 6, 2025
Lovin' this one, line after line!
Nancy Fierstien on Light on LeavesNovember 2, 2025
Yet another favorite of mine! How can I hold back this "THANK YOU!" ???
Sandi Hebley on How Fallen AngelsAugust 17, 2025
Indeed!
Nancy Fierstien on Unremember ThatAugust 16, 2025
Gonna be inclined to share this one at my Poets' Tea reading tomorrow afternoon. Thanks, Neil!
Sandi Hebley on Memory Lane JoggingAugust 5, 2025
Lovely!

Audio Recordings
Cattle
Cowboy Poetry
Cows
Environment
Family
Farm
Flight
Haiku
Limerick
Manure
Nature
News
Nostalgia
Personal Growth
Pilots
Poems about Poetry
Ranch Life
Relationships
Remembering
String Too Short To Save
Travel
Uncategorized

Tags

Aboriginal Aging Alcohol Art Art & Artists Autumn Beauty Birds Childhood Communication Connection Covid19 Death Dogs Dreams Faith Family Fear First Nations Friendship Gratitude Grief Healing Hope Horses Humor Loss Love Mother Music Nature Perspective Poetry Prairie Psychology Ranch Life Regret Religion sensuality Solitude Spring Voice Dialogue War Winter Wisdom

©2015 Neil Meili. All Right Reserved.

Theme Designed By ThemeVan | Powered by WordPress

Loading Comments...

Write a Comment...

Email

Name

Website