Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Why Not the Beautiful Words

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / tagged Childhood, Delight, Language, Whimsy / December 6, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Why don't 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 schledhammer ring

Wouldn't Italian farfalla, Spanish mariposa or the Portuguese borboleta be betta

Why not the tres French papillon
does it not taste on 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 much 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

Words in a Poem

Audio Recordings, Poems about Poetry / December 5, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

You wrote them down
and then they were there

Putting Ancestry.com
through an AI data blender
might guess where they came from
It doesn't matter

Some words are small c catholic
and may try to shuffle around a bit

Some words are
old time large C Catholic
and can never get a divorce

None of the words can get a divorce
A poem is a poem

Do Not Complain

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Fear, Love, Optimism, Pessimism / December 4, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Do not complain
that rain or love has come too late

That kind of coat will keep you much too dry

Do not complain for fear
that complaining will keep them forever away

That kind of coat will keep you much too cold

That Conversation

Audio Recordings, Personal Growth, Relationships, Travel / tagged Communication, Connection / December 3, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Met in a resort hotel
across the peninsula from Athens
a retired ship owner who had just returned
from speaking at a conference in Delphi
on magic in the modern world

He talked about Delphi having been a library
where people gathered knowledge
before asking the oracle for the spirit side

He said Dorsey and I had to go to Delos and why

He said sometimes you have this conversation
and held his hands about hands-width apart
and sometimes you have this conversation
with hands as far apart as a fisherman’s lie

We had that conversation

This Thanksgiving I sat with John Lee
fellow poet fellow traveler on so many trails

We had that conversation - Hope you have many too

My Uncle Shot My Dog

Audio Recordings, Cowboy Poetry, Family, Farm, Ranch Life, Relationships / tagged Death, Dogs, Forgiveness, Loyalty / December 1, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

My uncle shot my dog

My ever loving ever loyal saved me from the coyotes
Went back to the ranch to lead my parents to me
stuck in the mud - just like in the movies - Lassie dog

My uncle shot my dog

Maybe she had took to bitin’ people
if she did I’m sure they had it coming

Maybe she’d got to eatin’ the chickens
if she did she’d earned every one

Maybe she was old and sick and hurtin’
maybe she was better off dead than alive

I don’t remember anyone saying that
but I doubt it would’ve helped
Not when it’s your best friend - and you’re five

My uncle shot my dog

My uncle shot my dog
and went to his grave unforgiven
Maybe I can get it done before I go to mine

For Victor

Audio Recordings, Relationships / tagged Aging, Care, Dogs, Love / November 30, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The only trick an old dog can learn
is how to be an old dog

The minimum of turns one has to take
before lying down for that nap

That a bark is as good as a chase
for keeping squirrels off the deck

And that after all these years
of standing up for your standing friends
you've likely earned their kneeling by you now

Little Finnegan’s Wake

Audio Recordings / tagged Death, Determination, Dogs, Heroism, James Joyce, Literature, Loyalty, Tenacity / November 29, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Finnegan’s Wake
is a model of travail over time

It took James Joyce 17 years to write
and might take you that long to read

Finnegan is also the name
of a little Jack Russell Terrier
who went hiking with her master
Rich Moore near Pagosa Springs Colorado

They found them seventy-two days later
on a rugged slope in the San Juan Mountains
Rich leaning dead against a yellow pine
and Finnegan still fiercely standing guard
Neither Finnegan nor Joyce knew how to give up

Click here to read more about Finney’s harrowing journey: https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/exploration-survival/richard-moore-jack-russell-terrier-pagosa-springs/

1 Reply

Ralph

Audio Recordings, Farm, Ranch Life / tagged Dogs / November 28, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Ralph was a lab
and mostly smart as a lab
yet dumb as smart people can be

Examples of dumb...
Leaping on point from the back of a pickup
when a covey of quail had flushed
and skinning his nose on the landing
Putting porcupine on the menu for lunch
and coming home with a mouthful of quills

Example of smart...
Listening to me explain
how when you live on a ranch
forty miles from a vet I'm the vet
and quietly letting me pull them all out

Movies Got It Wrong

Audio Recordings, Cattle, Cows, Farm, Ranch Life / tagged Cowboys, Westerns, Work / November 27, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Most of the real cowboying
was riding off into the sunrise

Saddling up in the first half-light
to get to where the cattle are
while those doggies are still doggy

Do as much with them as you can
before the heat and the heel flies hit
then head your tired horses home

Sunsets ain't for riding into
they're meant for bullshit and beer
leaning on the fence like you earned it

Jim

Audio Recordings, Farm, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Aging, Persepective, Tobacco / November 26, 2023 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

First year on the ranch one of the hands was Jim
seventy years old and Methuselah to my twenty-one

Five foot two with always a chew
never walked but ran wherever he went
tractor to truck, house to barn he never slowed down

Now that I've reached his age and passed it
starting to realize what he might have been running from

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