Poetry by Rowan Evans

Author’s Note

People often ask what inspires my writing, or how my mind moves from one idea to another so quickly.

The honest answer is that I don’t think in straight lines.

I think in association, in rhythm, in collision. One idea reminds me of another, not because they are logically connected, but because they feel connected in the moment they appear.

This poem is built from that process.

It began with something simple—the familiar phrase “sugar, spice, and everything nice.” But as I wrote, my mind immediately followed the same pattern it always does: connection, exaggeration, humor, memory, and cultural reference all colliding at once. What starts as something familiar quickly becomes something unpredictable.

The title, Chemical X, comes from that idea.

In The Powerpuff Girls, Chemical X is the unknown element that transforms something ordinary into something entirely different. For me, that “unknown element” is the way my mind blends thoughts, images, and meanings together in real time.

This poem is not meant to be linear. It is meant to mirror the way my thoughts actually arrive: rapid, associative, sometimes chaotic, but always connected by feeling and intuition rather than structure.

If it feels like a mix of humor, storytelling, sports commentary, and surreal imagery all at once—that’s intentional. That is the point.

This is what happens when everything gets mixed together.

This is Chemical X.

— Rowan Evans

Chemical X
Poetry by Rowan Evans

They say “penny for your thoughts,”
but it takes—two cents to talk.
Go for a walk, a mile long, in my shoes—
use my eyes, see the world through my view.

I’ll etch it across the page,
world view and all—
because I’m the on the ball
point pen, in an ink sprint.
Usain Bolt, the way my mind went.

To understand the rhythm,
you’ve got to understand the mechanism.
You’ve got to understand the mind
behind the rhyme—

my thoughts are rapid fire.

Thirty round magazine,
three-round burst—
that’s the way my mind works.

I can jump from cartoons
to comic books,
music to sports—

sugar, spice,
and everything nice.

A round of applause, Johnny—
Bravo, you completed the Quest.
You gained experience and leveled up.
Still, it wasn’t enough—

because I’m a two-way threat—
like my name is Shohei.

Bitch, I’m the Babe.

At four years old,
I was almost tossed
out of the game.

I was a menace—
call me, Dennis.

Two Hubbles
strapped to my face,
look up—see space.

Fingers curled
gripping the chain link—
a bad call, a blind ump,
a small child
blind as I was,
offering their eyes up
like I was—

trying to help?
Maybe.

Trying to insult?

Of course…

it’s sports…

I was Dexter
in the lab again,
pen to pad again,
and I gave
all I had to give—

Victor Frankenstein
is at it again,
patchwork metaphors
and images galore—

villagers are going
to be afraid for sure.

Journey into the Hexverse…

[Crossing the Sea (No Metaphor Left Behind)]
A deeply personal poem about relocation, longing, and the realization that some truths naturally arrive through metaphor—even when we try to leave it behind.

[Only Waiting (No Metaphor Left Behind)]
The second poem in the No Metaphor Left Behind series, exploring the quiet ache of growing up in a place that never truly felt like home—and finally saying aloud what years of metaphor had been trying to express.

[Translating What I Feel]
A poem about the invisible process of turning emotion into imagery, imagery into language, and language into poetry. An intimate reflection on creativity, loneliness, and twenty-three years of learning to translate what the heart feels.

[Monster Theology]
What if the monsters under the bed weren’t monsters at all? Monster Theology explores difference, belonging, and the human tendency to fear what we don’t understand through a conversation with the creatures we’ve spent our lives imagining.

[Frankenstein’s Monster (and I’m the Doctor)]
Some poems are built to make a point. Others are built to reveal the mechanism. Frankenstein’s Monster (and I’m the Doctor) explores associative thinking, creative chaos, and the strange process of stitching disconnected ideas into something alive.

If you’re interested in more poetry, you can find it here → [The Library of Ashes]