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Best Poems Written by John Newlin

Below are the all-time best John Newlin poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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The River

The River

The river sings its sweet lament
in ancient voice softly lowing,
vibrant melodies subtly meant
to plumb the depths of our knowing.

Around each bend it curves, flowing
onward toward its fated reunion
with unkempt sea, wild and blowing;
embracing briney communion.

Its serpentine course scars the land
in undulant brown profusion;
shimmering gold in twilight's hand,
a gift of nature's effusion.

Pregnant spring plies it, unleashing
tempest's turgid downpour to slake
the lusty spate's thirst unceasing,
leaving ravaged marl in its wake.

Torrid summer's breath chars the soil
and saps the river of its strength,
but cool and sweet, the river's toil
paints a green ribbon down its length.

Demon winter glazes the earth,
garbs the river in frigid gown,
draws a pane of ice over its girth
but fails to stay its flowing down.

Since time out of mind, the river
has carved canyons from stubborn stone
and sought naught but to deliver
its lifeblood back to heaven's home.

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Body Or Soul

Body or Soul

Too often, when looking back, when memories grip
the mind and remind the heart of their sting
while breathing life into the days that sing
of when heart tempted heart and lip brushed lip.
That once there was no fitting time for tears
when the taste of despair began to cling
to passion's pouring from the heart's wellspring, 
while love's cold debt lingered in arrears.

Unreconciled yearnings of the past
exhume the soul of the body whose charms
reside in the glade where sylvan bells toll.
I am not sad, because I see at last
the folly of grasping at love with both arms, 
scarce knowing which is body and which soul.

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The Last Soulmate

The Last Soulmate 
 
I turned to Love and asked her,
"At long last is this my best day?"
Love's fickle eyes swift averted
as she gave her cold answer, "Nay."
 
I turned to Hope and beseeched her,
"Do you lurk deep in Love's domain?"
With a careless shrug Hope replied,
"From all promise I must abstain."
 
I turned to Faith and pressed her,
"Will your constancy yet hold sway?"
Faith sighed and casually replied,
"Pledges are made to be betrayed."
 
I turned to Desire and bid her
"Will you the full distance go?"
Desire's soft voice was coldly lent,
"I may dampen passion fire's glow."
 
I turned to Loneliness and asked,
"Shall you then be my heart's parole?"
Loneliness took my hand and sighed,
"I'm the last mate of your numb soul."

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Friendship's Wine

Friendship's Wine

From comity's grape comes the wine
that so enchanted our lips,
and stimulated our palate
with every precious sip.

From the golden years
far back in the day
comes the precious knowing
that we each have found our way.

We met in fate's vinyard
while plying our life's trade,
each embracing the other's
respect, readily displayed

From our last sip of the wine,
when it's poured, red and dry,
know our friendship shall endure
beyond our last goodbye.

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Helen

Helen

The face that launched 
a thousand ships
smiled at me across the years.

Dark brilliant eyes
and perfect lips
reflecting in timeless mirrors.

Her poise, her grace,
her Grecian brow,
invaded my unguarded mind.

Lithe supple frame
so near somehow,
more intoxicating than the wine.

Ancient beauty,
yet so young;
the lure of fervor's afterglow?

Sweet liquid love,
from olive wrung,
forbidden fruit I dare not know.
 
My grape is too ripe
to suit the blend,
her heart lies beyond my zeal,

yet fair Helen
shall be sweet friend
and ever my Achilles heel.

Details | John Newlin Poem

A Mother's Goodbye

A Mother's Goodbye

She clutched the triangular fold
of white stars on a blue field
as she stood on the hallowed ground.

She sang dolefully, with a reverence
that shaped the tremulous tone
of her weary, aging voice.

Her song was thinned by despair
yet was thickened by the memory 
of all the years of his youth.

The words drifted on her voice
like curling leaves on the water
of a swirling, muddy creek.

The damp forest absorbed
the resonance of her lyrics,
as if fearing an echo might offend.

When her song ended 
its mournful cry was answered
by the plaintive trill of a meadowlark.

She knelt and touched the stone
marking her warrior's place in eternity,
and whispered goodbye to her son.

Details | John Newlin Poem

Images

Images

Searing cold vibrations
ringing in the well;
shifting sands in the moonlight
obscuring the only trail.

A song sinking, shattered
upon a dissonant reef;
pregnant clouds low flying
over the tidal grief.

Voices in crescendo
of sharply focused gall;
severed strands fraying
in the fabric of the soul.

Frail wings in the darkness
fleeing a ruptured storm;
footprints in the desert,
leagues away from home.

Pale cheeks in black boxes
hewed from fated pine;
black lace and white candles
sputtering in the rain.

Reckless thirst rippling
placid pools of bliss;
a rusty mirror reflecting
faint imprint of a kiss.

Fragrant guile oozing
down a fickle brow;
faithless eyes drowning
in the melting of the snow.

Wormy bark peeling on
bent sapling in the glen;
a crown of weighty branches
bowing to the wind.

Such are the graying images
painful in the grasp;
kaleidoscopic fragments
of life's fragile glass,

embedded in the depths
of memory's own thick balm
congealing in the ashes
of a time long since gone.

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Cold Steel, Hot Blood

Cold Steel, Hot Blood

Cold blue steel gleaming in the night,
coldly importuning a hot hand,
death clad in a copper jacket,
innocent flesh and blood outmanned.

Sight lines of anger and rage,
beads drawn on defenseless souls,
whether purposeful or random,
take a disastrous bloody toll.

Since the savage hand of murder
clenched the gun in lieu of the sword,
shots echoing through city canyons,
lay waste all hope of urban accord.

Abraham, Martin and John,
Ronald took a bullet too,
loyal servants of the people
who died in our gun crazy zoo.

Trigger pulls by unhinged souls
stain the breaking news of the day..
A shameful national curse
that won't end with Santa Fe.

Bodies riddled with ammunition
meant to wound, maim and slay
fired from guns so easily bought
thanks to zealots of the NRA.

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Why Music

Why Music

Why music do I so fondly embrace
in lieu of bending to the planet's din
or seeking an atom's relative place
and the orbital mysteries therein?

Why do l spurn the lure of fluid grain
and turn hard away from the tainted leaf,
preferring rather a mournful refrain
embodied in a tenor's dulcet grief?

Is it in the need so to emulate
the hue and passion of musical tone
and thus by my heart's rhythm orchestrate
the kneeling close by sweet melody's throne?

The liquid beauty of harmonic chords,
echoing days of wonder, days of  bliss,
fill my heart brimming with the sweet rewards,
blessed memories of each and every kiss.

Details | John Newlin Poem

Hands of America

Hands of America

Hand-over-hand: arduous climb
up the ladder of success.
Hand made: goods from a foreign land,
homeland in economic distress.

Hand-in-hand: dire collusion
with despots of detention
by the leaders of the state
that forged liberty's invention.
 
Underhanded: the undermining
of the only black president;
white hands applying black face,
inciting hatred and malcontent.

Handgun: a clutched firearm
with trigger pull light as breath;
handles on the side of a casket,
results of a violent shooting death.

Handover: a secret tactic
of those whose secret mission
results in the torture of those
sent abroad for extreme rendition.

Handiwork: the bloody results
of falsehoods of those who swore
that our homeland was in danger,
that we must send our best into war.

Handhold: a grip on reality
by people needing a hand.
Hands off: the response of 
those who seek to rule this land.