Rain has a strange way of making the world feel quieter.
Sometimes that quiet gives the mind room to speak.
And sometimes the mind doesn’t whisper.
Louder Than the Rain is a small piece about one of those moments—when everything outside is making noise, yet somehow the loudest thing in the room is what’s happening inside your own head.
So listen closely.
— Rowan Evans
When the world gets quiet, sometimes the thoughts get louder.
Louder Than the Rain Poetry by Rowan Evans
I sat listening to the rainfall,
watching it hit and splash upon the ground—
the way my tears fell,
I was surrounded, but it felt like nobody was around.
I was alone in a packed house—
why was the silence so fucking…
my thoughts were loud,
they were drowning my thoughts out.
I was so damn nervous,
hands in my hair, I was pulling it—
just wanted to scream and shout,
it was the only way to get my feelings out.
But I couldn’t shout loud, so I rode it out—
translated the pain to the page.
Yeah, I wrote it out…
Journey into the Hexverse
[My Nightmare] A poem about the nightmare of loving someone across distance, seeing the world from different perspectives, and holding onto the hope that the cracks can still be repaired—and that someday two separate shores might become one.
[Nobody² (No Body)] A minimalist poem playing with the double meaning of “nobody”—exploring loneliness, isolation, absence, and the feeling of becoming a ghost within your own life.
[Rose & Ruin] Two minimalist poems exploring the opposing forces within creativity: the thoughts we cultivate into something beautiful and the darker thoughts we transform before they have a chance to decay.
Sometimes absence isn’t just being alone. Sometimes it feels like having no body at all.
Nobody² (No Body) Poetry by Rowan Evans
I’m a nobody,
I’ve got nobody.
I’m just a ghost—
I’ve got no body.
[Rose & Ruin] Two minimalist poems exploring the opposing forces within creativity: the thoughts we cultivate into something beautiful and the darker thoughts we transform before they have a chance to decay.
[Conductor] A dark, intimate poem about the strange power words can have over the reader—where rhythm, rhyme, and line breaks become instruments capable of reaching beyond the page.
Others arrive already carrying the scent of decay.
These two minimalist pieces were written as companions—two sides of the same creative process. One looks toward cultivation, growth, and the strange beauty of watching an idea become something tangible. The other looks toward the thoughts that come darker, older, or already beginning to rot.
Together, Rose and Ruin sit in the same garden.
One grows.
One decays.
Both become poetry.
— Rowan Evans
Rose & Ruin Poems by Rowan Evans
Somewhere between ink and imagination, the garden begins to bloom.
Rose Poetry by Rowan Evans
I plant a seed and water it,
creativity and ink, fertilizing it—
watching masterpieces bloom
in a garden of thoughts.
Even the thoughts that rot can still become something worth writing.
Ruin Poetry by Rowan Evans
I use ’em—
before the thoughts rot,
but I’m a gothic poet—
I’ll still use the rotten thoughts,
I see the world through ’em.
Journey into the Hexverse…
[Conductor] A dark, intimate poem about the strange power words can have over the reader—where rhythm, rhyme, and line breaks become instruments capable of reaching beyond the page.
[The Answer Is (Yes)] What kind of writer am I? Mythmaker, confessor, comedian, philosopher, dream-architect, romantic, storyteller, and diss-poet. This self-reflective poem explores the impossibility of fitting creativity into a single category—and embraces every version of the truth a pen can touch.
[Finish What You Started] A dark introspective poem about confronting the past, carrying old versions of yourself, and realizing that the only way forward is through the fire.
And then there are poems that quietly reach through the page and take hold of something you thought belonged entirely to you.
Conductor comes from that space—the strange little boundary between writer and reader, where words stop being marks on a page and start becoming something physical.
I wanted to play with that boundary.
So take a breath before you begin.
Then read.
— Rowan Evans
Some conductors lead an orchestra. Others conduct the breath between the lines.
Conductor Poetry by Rowan Evans
I’m a conductor—
watch me
control your breath.
Won’t even
be in the room—
you just have
to read the words
that I’ve left—
you can feel
my influence
in your chest—
I confess—
you breathe the way I tell you to,
this is what I will do—I will extend the lines,
implement some rhymes—show you,
that your breath is not your own,
it is mine to control—
Journey into the Hexverse…
[The Crypt] A mysterious man watches from a crypt as a woman enters the graveyard and kneels before an unnamed grave. In this compact gothic poem, fascination, death, and possession blur together beneath the shadows of the cemetery.
[Dreaming Wrong] A familiar dream becomes unsettling when the ocean becomes a pond, the tide disappears, the moon loses its reflection, and nothing feels quite like it belongs. Dreaming Wrong explores the uncanny feeling of finding yourself inside a dream that looks familiar—but feels like someone else’s.
[Did You Really Think This Was About Trees?] A playful love poem disguised as a forest of terrible tree puns. Beneath the birch, oak, cedar, palms, lumber, and absurdist wordplay is a poem about devotion, loyalty, laughter, and building a life with someone you love.
Some places don’t just hold the dead—they hold the stories, obsessions, and shadows that refuse to leave them.
The Crypt Poetry by Rowan Evans
Don’t you see—
the one where the crypt sleeps?
The crypt is a man with no soul,
a body with no home, left to roam.
He sleeps in his namesake—
watches the graveyard
from the same place.
He sees her when she walks in.
He can see the gates from there.
“She looks radiant as ever—”
he thinks, as she seems to shrink
with eyes down,
not looking at the world.
He wants to—
when she thinks
nobody is looking,
he really sees her—
she kneels before a grave,
he can’t see the name,
but he’s made his claim—
the crypt will keep her.
Author’s Note
The Crypt is a short gothic piece built around the idea of a place becoming a person—and a person becoming inseparable from the place that bears their name.
The crypt is both a physical location and a metaphorical state: a man who feels emptied out, disconnected from the world, watching life pass from the shadows. When he sees her enter the graveyard, his attention gives him something to focus on, but that fascination quickly becomes something darker.
I wanted the poem to feel almost like a fragment of a larger gothic story—something glimpsed through the gates of a graveyard rather than fully explained. We don’t know who she is visiting, what happened to the crypt’s occupant, or what exactly he means when he decides that “the crypt will keep her.”
That’s intentional.
Some gothic stories are frightening because of what they reveal.
Others are frightening because of what they leave hidden.
— Rowan Evans
Journey into the Hexverse…
[Fallen Angel’s Reckoning (Remix)] Fallen Angel’s Reckoning (Remix) revisits a 2024 poem about heartbreak, broken promises, and falling from an imagined heaven, transforming its original ending into a darker meditation on resilience, self-reclamation, and learning to fly with broken wings.
[Homecoming] Fallen Angel’s Reckoning (Remix) revisits a 2024 poem about heartbreak, broken promises, and falling from an imagined heaven, transforming its original ending into a darker meditation on resilience, self-reclamation, and learning to fly with broken wings.
[The Monster in the Margins II] The Monster in the Margins II transforms Rowan Evans’s Seven Deadly Sins mythology into a horror story written between the lines, where Lust, Wrath, Sloth, Greed, Pride, Envy, and Gluttony become monsters growing from pain, grudges, and scars.
[Pride] ‘Pride’ towers over all else, a seductive and deceptive force. The seventh of the 7 Deadly Sonnets, exploring hubris, self-importance, and the masks we wear.
[Through the Shattered Glass: Before the Glass Shattered] Before the glass shatters, shadows linger and memories twist. Discover the haunting prelude to B.D. Nightshade’s “Through the Shattered Glass” series—where ordinary moments become portals to fractured realities.
Some poems don’t need to be abandoned when we outgrow the person who originally wrote them.
Sometimes they need to be revisited.
Undead Symphony (Remix) returns to a poem I originally wrote on June 13, 2024. The original was written from a place I understood intimately: feeling perpetually misplaced, overlooked, and emotionally exhausted while still carrying an enormous capacity for empathy underneath the numbness.
The title came from that contradiction.
An undead thing is neither fully alive nor truly dead. A symphony, meanwhile, is full of movement, emotion, tension, and sound. Put those ideas together and you get something that feels very close to the emotional state I was trying to describe: a person who can feel deeply while simultaneously becoming distant from the world around them.
That contradiction is still here in 2026.
What changed is the way I approach it.
The remix gives the poem more room to breathe. I broke apart lines that had previously been compressed together, allowing certain thoughts to linger rather than rushing past them. I also sharpened some of the imagery and cadence, particularly around the relationship between solitude, apathy, and empathy.
The original poem said what I was feeling.
The remix feels more like I understand why I was saying it.
And that distinction matters.
I have spent a lot of time in my writing exploring darkness—not because darkness is all I have, but because I have always been fascinated by the strange things that can survive inside it. Undead Symphony is one of those pieces.
Apathy and empathy shouldn’t fit together.
Yet somehow, they do.
One protects the heart by making the world feel distant.
The other keeps reaching toward it anyway.
That tension is the symphony.
The speaker may feel undead, but the music never actually stops.
— Rowan Evans
Somewhere between apathy and empathy, something inside me keeps making music.
Undead Symphony (Remix) Poetry by Rowan Evans [written on July 23, 2026]
It was always the wrong place,
wrong time—
I was always second best,
never first place—
Never the one to win the race,
I was always the one they laughed at,
never with—
always the one that
when they were gone—
never missed.
So I grew cold and distant
like far-off summer nights,
yearned for on cold winter mornings.
And sometimes—
it still feels hard to breathe,
like a shadow in the light,
fading beneath.
I never was one for faith,
I never believed,
no thoughts and no prayers—
because why should anybody care?
In a crowd I felt alone,
a silent voice,
an empty phone.
It’s apathy—
and I pair it with my empathy.
An odd dance of light and dark,
within me.
It’s beauty in the darkness,
an undead symphony.
But still—I dream of a place,
where I’m more than just a face.
A spark in the night,
a fleeting glimpse
of warmth in the cold,
and strength in the struggle.
I remember moments—
fleeting and rare,
of laughter shared,
of someone who cared.
Brief as they were,
they lit up my sky,
A reminder that even shadows can try.
Yet—
I return to the solitude I know,
where apathy is my only show.
But my empathy,
a hidden grace—
whispers of a longing for a different place.
It’s a contradiction,
a twisted art—
to feel so much,
with a guarded heart.
An undead symphony,
a haunting tune—
a dance of shadows beneath the moon.
Journey into the Hexverse…
[Fallen Angel’s Reckoning (Remix)] Fallen Angel’s Reckoning (Remix) revisits a 2024 poem about heartbreak, broken promises, and falling from an imagined heaven, transforming its original ending into a darker meditation on resilience, self-reclamation, and learning to fly with broken wings.
There are certain aesthetics that feel less like something we choose and more like something we recognize.
For me, Gothic imagery has always been one of those things.
Homecoming came from the realization that something in my writing had started to feel slightly unfamiliar. I was still writing about the moon, the ocean, the tides, ravens, horror, darkness, and the strange spaces where beauty and pain overlap—but somehow, I had drifted away from the particular Gothic atmosphere that has always felt like home to me.
So this poem became a return.
Poe is here because his shadow has been part of my literary DNA for years. Nyx and Hades are here because mythology gives me another language for darkness. The ravens are here because, in my own symbolic architecture, they have become witnesses, messengers, and companions. And the horror references—Jason, Ghostface, Pennywise, Michael Myers—are there because horror has never been merely about monsters to me.
It is about what the monsters represent.
Grief. Fear. Obsession. Rage. The parts of ourselves that refuse to stay buried.
There is also something deliberately self-aware about this poem. I am not simply listing Gothic references because they sound dark. I am talking about my relationship with the imagery itself—the way the moon has accumulated meaning across my work, the way the tides connect to emotion, and the way ravens have gradually become part of my mythology.
The darkness isn’t an aesthetic costume.
It’s architecture.
And after spending some time writing away from it, I realized that I wasn’t trying to become something new.
I was finding my way back to something that had been mine all along.
That’s why this poem is called Homecoming.
Sometimes you don’t discover where you belong.
Sometimes you remember.
— Rowan Evans
Sometimes the darkness isn’t somewhere you wandered into. Sometimes it’s the place where your voice has always felt most at home.
Homecoming Poetry by Rowan Evans
I’ve been writing like
I forgot which domain is mine,
I’m of the darkness—
just borrowed the light,
and made Poe’s throne my birthright.
I’m a gothic romantic,
I bleed for the art—
I’ve kissed the lips of Nyx
and wandered through
the realm of Hades.
I’m a poltergeist in life,
but at night I come alive—
witching hour is when I thrive.
I pray to the moon
and curse the sun—
I ascend to the throne
that Poe had spun.
I watch the ravens—
carrying messages where they fly,
eyes locked, tracking the treachery across the sky.
They are always watching—
silent witnesses to the rot inside.
It started to feel like something
in my pieces was missing—
like where was the gothic lace,
silk and satin sin, velvet and venom.
There was too much light—
even when ninety percent
of my imagery is night adjacent,
weaving in horror rhymes—
Friday the 13th, Night of Jason.
The moon in my rhymes has meaning,
when I write lines like the tides—I mean it,
even in my Ghostface cadence—
what’s your favorite scary movie?
Pennywise of the mind, sewer of thought—
I’m a monster like Michael,
when I chase—I don’t run, I walk.
Journey into the Hexverse…
[The Monster in the Margins] Drawing inspiration from horror icons like Michael Myers, Ghostface, Freddy Krueger, and Pennywise, this poem explores the darker side of creativity—where inspiration becomes an unstoppable force lurking just beyond the edge of the page.
[The Monster in the Margins II] The Monster in the Margins II transforms Rowan Evans’s Seven Deadly Sins mythology into a horror story written between the lines, where Lust, Wrath, Sloth, Greed, Pride, Envy, and Gluttony become monsters growing from pain, grudges, and scars.
[The Unkindness Descends] “The Unkindness Descends” is a Gothic symbolic poem exploring collapse, transformation, and the unsettling experience of being witnessed during moments of unraveling. Through raven imagery, ambiguity, and ritualistic atmosphere, the poem invites multiple interpretations—spiritual, psychological, ominous, or transformative.
[Gospel in Crimson] When writing becomes ritual and love becomes devotion, the line between creation and worship begins to blur. Gospel in Crimson explores obsession, artistry, and the sacred act of expression.
I’ve always loved horror—not simply for the blood, the monsters, or the jump scares, but because horror has a remarkable ability to turn internal things into something we can see.
The Monster in the Margins began as a playful collision of horror references. Slasher villains, supernatural imagery, Japanese horror, and the cadence of a poet treating the page like a horror movie. The monster was partly familiar because I was borrowing from stories I already knew.
This one is different.
The Monster in the Margins II picks up where that first poem left off, but instead of borrowing the monster, I built my own.
The Seven Deadly Sins had already become part of my mythology through 7 Deadly Sonnets. Here, Lust, Wrath, Sloth, Greed, Pride, Envy, and Gluttony aren’t simply abstract sins or religious concepts—they become creatures in the margins, haunting rooms, sleeping beneath pillows, sitting on chests, consuming whatever they can find.
And that is where horror becomes useful again.
Because the scariest monsters aren’t always the ones chasing you.
Sometimes they’re the things you carry.
A grudge can become a monster.
Apathy can become a tomb.
Desire can become something that sleeps beside you.
Pride can consume.
Envy can hollow you out.
And sometimes the very things we plant in the margins eventually grow into something we can no longer control.
The first poem asked what happens when the poet becomes the monster.
This one asks what happens when the poet starts creating monsters of their own.
Every sin is a seed.
Every ache can bloom.
And sometimes the garden grows in the margins.
— Rowan Evans
Every sin is a seed planted in the margins—every ache a bloom in the garden of scars.
The Monster in the Margins II Poetry by Rowan Evans
You can’t get rid of me—
I hold a grudge,
wrote 7 Deadly Sonnets
and prayed for your downfall
after every single one.
I went Ichi with a pen,
killer with a devilish grin.
I carved each sin into the margins,
let every stanza rot and bloom—
now Lust sleeps beneath your pillow,
and Wrath is pacing in your room.
With Sloth sitting upon your chest—
the ghost that haunts your bones,
turning this room into your tomb.
The slow death of apathy
is all that waits for you.
Even if you find the will to move,
Greed and Pride will still consume
until you’re left with nothing but Envy.
And you’ll turn glutton to try and fill—
but nothing feeds the hollow I’ve carved.
Every sin is a seed I planted,
every ache a bloom in my garden of scars.
Journey into Hexverse…
[The Monster in the Margins] Drawing inspiration from horror icons like Michael Myers, Ghostface, Freddy Krueger, and Pennywise, this poem explores the darker side of creativity—where inspiration becomes an unstoppable force lurking just beyond the edge of the page.
[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.
I’ve always loved horror—not for the blood or the jump scares, but because horror understands metaphor.
The best monsters are never just monsters.
They’re grief. They’re guilt. They’re obsession. They’re the parts of ourselves we’d rather keep locked in the basement.
This poem started as a playful exercise in horror references. I wanted to see how many iconic slasher and supernatural figures I could weave together without losing the rhythm.
But somewhere along the way, the references stopped being the point.
The “monster” became the creative voice itself.
The one that refuses to stay quiet. The one that follows me from notebook to notebook, insisting on another poem, another line, another draft.
Writers often talk about inspiration as something beautiful.
Sometimes it is.
Sometimes it’s relentless.
Sometimes it feels less like a muse…
and more like the monster waiting patiently in the margins until you pick up the pen again.
— Rowan Evans
“Every writer knows the feeling—the story isn’t always waiting on the page. Sometimes it’s waiting in the margins.”
The Monster in the Margins Poetry by Rowan Evans
I’m a literary slasher villain,
Michael Myers with a pen.
I’m a humorous menace,
a terror with a clown’s face—
Pennywise in my rhymes,
with a Ghostface rhythm.
It’s Kruger in the cadence,
you can try and imitate it.
I’m the ghost that haunts
these old bones—
the groan in the rafters
of this old home—
I’m the eyes you can’t seem to shake,
the reason you never feel alone.
My poetry is a whisper
in an empty room,
the cold chill in the air—
I weave lines with rhymes
like hidden messages
in the mirror.
Bloody Mary.
Redrum—
a horror scene
on college-ruled—
notebook full
of nightmare fuel.
I am the Pulse
in the Infection,
the killer’s Resurrection.
Red tape won’t stop this.
It’s a ritual, no control—
you’ve lost it.
I’m the creeping dread,
the scream inside your head.
The tingle in your spine—
a voice echoing to no end.
I’m the shadow you cast in your own mind—
the part of you that never dies.
Journey into the Hexverse…
[Returning to My Bones] – Rowan Evans Some dreams fade the moment we wake. Others leave behind emotions that linger long after reality returns. Returning to My Bones explores the strange grief of leaving a dream that felt real enough to matter.
[Before My Feet Touch the Floor] – Rowan Evans What happens when your dreams feel more real than your waking life? Before My Feet Touch the Floor explores the strange grief of waking up, the lingering memory of dream selves, and the quiet question of which version of us is truly real.
[The Hunted] – B.D. Nightshade Under a blood-red Oklahoma moon, predators stalk the silent fields—and one soul learns what it means to be chosen by the night.
[Cannibal Carnival] – B.D. Nightshade A carnival arrives under cover of mist—bright tents, painted smiles, and a hunger that won’t stay hidden. By morning, only whispers remain.
[Ouija]– B.D. Nightshade A grieving soul seeks comfort through a Ouija board—only to discover that not every voice from the dark belongs to the dead we miss.
[Before the Glass Shattered] – B.D. Nightshade Before the glass shatters, shadows linger and memories twist. Discover the haunting prelude to B.D. Nightshade’s “Through the Shattered Glass” series—where ordinary moments become portals to fractured realities.
a person kneeling on broken marble while ravens circled overhead.
From there, the symbolism unfolded naturally.
Ravens have carried countless meanings across cultures and mythologies throughout history. Omens. Messengers. Witnesses. Archivists of the dead. Harbingers of transformation. Keepers of memory. In some traditions they are feared. In others, revered.
I didn’t want to narrow them down to one interpretation here.
What interested me more was the tension between collapse and observation—the feeling of being seen during moments of unraveling, and the uncertainty of whether those watching forces are condemning you, mourning you, studying you, guiding you, or simply recording what happened.
That’s why the poem never fully explains the ravens.
Even the collective noun “unkindness” became important to me while writing. It carries two meanings at once: a literal group of ravens, and the emotional atmosphere surrounding the speaker. The word itself becomes part of the tension.
By the end of the piece, the ravens remain unresolved intentionally.
They part. They watch. They follow.
Whether that final image feels threatening, protective, spiritual, psychological, or transformative depends almost entirely on how the reader chooses to see them.
And I think that uncertainty is the point.
— Rowan Evans
They descended like witnesses—whether to condemn, mourn, guide, or remember was never made clear.
The Unkindness Descends Poetry by Rowan Evans
I kneel on broken marble,
the unkindness circling overhead.
Ravens watching as I come undone.
Witnesses to my fall,
the ravens land—
one by one,
the unkindness descends
upon me.
I am lost in the black mass—
wing and feather flapping
as ravens move to circle me.
My eyes scanned the ravens
as they surrounded me,
each uttered something—
a word, a message.
Perhaps, it was a lesson?
Maybe I read it all wrong,
and they were just keeping record—
witnesses to my collapse.
I rose to my feet.
The ravens watched me.
I moved.
They parted
like the Red Sea.
Each step forward,
their eyes traced my path.
As I moved through,
they closed in behind me.
Following.
Journey into the Hexverse…
[I Write Cathedrals] “I Write Cathedrals” explores faith, doubt, belonging, and the search for meaning beyond certainty. Through Gothic spiritual imagery and confessional reflection, the poem examines how writing can become a sacred space for questioning, wonder, and the people who feel displaced by traditional structures of belief.
[Drought Resistant] “Drought Resistant” is a confessional poem about growing up poor in California’s Central Valley—where triple-digit heat, EBT cycles, dry ramen, and hard landscapes become part of emotional memory. Blending humor, slang, and working-class reflection, the poem explores survival, regional identity, and complicated love for the place that shaped you.
[Escaped to the Page] “Escaped to the Page” is a confessional meta-poem about individuality, artistic identity, and surviving through writing. Blending sharp confidence with emotional vulnerability, the poem explores the difference between shared labels and lived experience—and the ways art becomes inseparable from the life behind it.
[Ink as a Second Mouth] “Ink as a Second Mouth” explores the distance between thought and speech, and the ways writing can become a form of survival, continuity, and self-translation. Through confessional imagery and reflections on growth, identity, and articulation, the poem examines what it means to keep becoming through language.
Poetry by Rowan Evans 