Ranch Life – Neil Meili

Neil Meili

Zen Cowboy Poet & Freelance Philosopher

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Category: Ranch Life

Driving on the Tracks

Audio Recordings, News, Ranch Life, Travel / tagged Pandemic / March 16, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

I think you are supposed
to take some air out
of the tires

It wasn’t something
that we thought about
gliding across the prairie night
with no one needing to steer
and lots of cold beer
and the throttle
(they had throttles then)

It is something we would
probably have thought about
going across the old wooden trestle
that and the freights that run at all hours

Except that we were too busy
holding back our friend in the back
almost as strong as the three of us
in his full blown panic

Trying to leap
over the front seat
to grab the quivering wheel

Image by David Mark from Pixabay

Old School

Cattle, Cowboy Poetry, Cows, Family, Farm, Ranch Life / tagged Education / March 3, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Uncle Emil, a good man
through and through, knew school

Not from being there
but from watching those who had

Four years of university
and he still can’t milk a cow

The Cowboys The Pilots and Poets

Audio Recordings, Cowboy Poetry, Pilots, Poems about Poetry, Ranch Life / February 28, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The Cowboys, the Pilots and Poets
The girls they say love them all

For the pilots have an air of the danger
of those who can die if they fall

While a poet’s crushed-petal scent
reflects all their beauty and pain

And a cowboy has a feel of the open
and a smell we won’t speak of again

Maybe the pilots help them feel
life’s edge of purest blue

While the poets act as mirrors
to depths they never knew

And the cowboys oh the cowboys
can touch them where it hurts

And they’ve got those fast
snap button shirts

Flat Earther Grade One

Nostalgia, Ranch Life, Remembering / tagged Education / February 23, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Don’t be silly
the earth isn’t round it’s hilly

But you can’t tell a teacher
with a marble
as round and blue
as my eyes that knew
that what they saw was true

so she taught
and taught till I forgot
but the hills were never the same

Image by Kristin Baldwin from Pixabay

1 Reply

Memories that Stick #8 Flypaper in the Kitchen

Cowboy Poetry, Farm, Ranch Life / February 22, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Farms have flies
and choose who dies
and children learn it young

Ancient kings
put heads on pikes
to warn of upstarts fate

but didn’t have to listen to
the buzzing while they ate

Anvil

Farm, Poems about Poetry, Ranch Life / February 21, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The anvil is a shape
that shapes all shapes

From the horseshoe
to the horseshoe nail
from the stirrup to the jail

With the mud left over
from the making of man
God made anvil

Handed it to him
and said - You do the rest

Photo by Jonathan Bean on Unsplash

1 Reply

Time-Lapse Prairie

Farm, Nature, Ranch Life / February 12, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Clouds
chase shadows
across the hide of hills

Blues
of light and dark
mix in palate ponds

Two antelope
enter from the left and gone

A Prairie Villanelle

Audio Recordings, Farm, Nostalgia, Ranch Life, Travel / February 9, 2020 / 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 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

Cowboy Chivalry

Cowboy Poetry, Ranch Life, Relationships / tagged Smoking / January 14, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

The gallantry
to thumbnail strike the match
and cup the hands to shade the wind
to light the damsel’s cigarette

The courage
to kiss that breath

Red Cattle Haiku

Cattle, Cows, Farm, Haiku, Ranch Life / January 6, 2020 / by neil_2015_wordpress@neilmeili.com

Dad loved red cattle
counting sheep though soft and white
would keep him from sleep

1 Reply

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