Outskirts Press, INC.

In a world where we are becoming increasingly disconnected for “immediate” human interactions, Keith Neal searches for, and at the same time unconsciously avoids those human connections that give meaning to our journey. While he finds what expression and solace he can through his poetry - he finally must understand that life’s rejections come as much from himself as from others. But understanding does not always result in change or satisfaction. The Poet is a story of sex, drugs, rock and roll. It is a story of youth in the 1960s and 1970s, and the poetry of one life.

Denver! Mile High City! Mile High youth! Crossroads of the intra-national drug traffic - if not Mecca, then at least Medina for the flower children who were just beginning their brief blossom. Three quarters shit-kicking cowboy and one quarter pacifistic, dope smoking, pill popping sons and daughters of the shit kicking cowboys. Painted mountains reaching for sky, painted youth reaching for freedom. Keith Neal, newly freed from the restrictions of the Air Force, settled easily into the casual community that was yearning – pleading – crying for sex, pot and poetry. Armed with the tools of the trade and a fierce desire to explore and explain the inner world of the artist to the outer world of the seekers of truth, he found himself – as yet – unready for the task. The world he had known – a world of order and predictability and clear meaning (for good or bad), was not the world he now inhabited. The changes were overwhelming, confusing, delightful, hopeful, frightening and intriguing. There was a need to spend, waste and use time to assimilate the new wave of thought he found himself surrounded by and immersed in. He wanted to write – to rhyme – to exude brilliance, and yet he was at loss – twenty two with nothing to say.