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Poetry by Rowan Evans

Tag: Personal Growth

  • Pointing Me Home (No Metaphor Left Behind) | A Poem About Dreams, Hope & Finding Home

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem became the quiet conclusion to a trilogy I never intended to write.

    Crossing the Sea was about direction.

    Only Waiting was about the reason I needed that direction in the first place.

    This piece asks a different question:

    How do you keep moving when you haven’t arrived yet?

    For me, the answer has always been dreams.

    Not because I confuse them with reality, but because they remind me that another reality is possible.

    I’ve written about dreams for years. They rarely feel random to me. They often feel like rehearsals—small glimpses of a life my mind already believes exists somewhere beyond the horizon.

    The city in this poem isn’t a specific city.

    The moon isn’t really the moon.

    Even after spending two poems trying to strip away metaphor, I found myself sitting beside it again.

    I think that’s because hope has always spoken to me symbolically.

    When I’m awake, I know where I am.

    When I’m asleep, I remember where I’m going.

    The dream doesn’t replace reality.

    It sustains me until reality catches up.

    The final image—a dream folded into my chest like a map—is probably the clearest way I’ve ever described hope.

    Hope isn’t certainty.

    It isn’t arrival.

    It’s carrying the direction with you, even when you’re still standing at the beginning of the journey.

    And maybe that’s what this trilogy has been trying to say all along.

    Sometimes home begins as a place.

    Sometimes it becomes an ache.

    Sometimes…

    it’s simply the direction you’re already walking.

    — Rowan Evans

    A lone figure sits beneath a full moon where an ocean shoreline transitions into quiet city streets, holding a folded map while reflecting on hope, dreams, and the journey toward home.
    “Sometimes home isn’t where you’re standing—it’s the direction you’re already walking.” 🌙🗺️

    Pointing Me Home (No Metaphor Left Behind)
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Tick tock, tick tock—
    that’s the sound of the clock.
    I listen as I wait for the escape,
    a simple trip, brought on by sleep.
    Because I only feel at home
    in my dreams.

    So as I close my eyes
    and my head hits the pillow—
    I follow the moon
    to the ocean’s edge,
    I listen to the tide—
    I follow it in stride
    until I find where it’s pulling me.

    With every step,
    I move deeper in.
    Slowly sand turns to concrete
    beneath my feet,
    as the beach transitions
    into city streets.

    Streetlights flicker
    like they’re remembering
    they used to be stars.

    The hum of the city
    folds into the sound of waves,
    each echo a reminder
    of where I started
    and where I’m going.

    I walk until the moon
    hangs between buildings
    like it’s lost too—

    like it’s looking someone to talk to.

    So I sit and conversate,
    I tell the moon all about the quiet ache—
    the feeling that I need to change
    my environment to one that aligns
    more with what I feel inside.

    And the moon sits with me,
    just listening—so I talk some more.
    Out of my heart, the words just pour.
    I spill every secret, I hold nothing back
    until I feel like I might collapse.

    The moon listens,
    patient as ever,
    its light softening
    the edges of my thoughts.

    And when I finally fall silent,
    breath trembling,
    chest heavy—

    it tilts itself
    just enough
    to remind me
    I’m not alone
    in the places I wander.

    Tick tock, tick tock.

    A return to the rhythm of the clock,
    interrupting the talk—
    the moon’s light gives way
    to the sun’s rays,
    I’m still stuck in this place—

    but I’m only waiting
    until I can cross the sea,
    Pacific and the Philippine.

    Until then,
    I carry the dream like a map,
    folded in my chest—

    pointing me home.

    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.

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

  • Only Waiting (No Metaphor Left Behind) | A Poem About Home, Belonging, and Leaving

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem is the second part of an experiment I started in Crossing the Sea—an attempt to write without leaning on metaphor, or at least to notice when metaphor appears even when I’m trying not to use it.

    The first piece focused on direction: the place I’m moving toward, the literal ocean I have to cross to get there. But I realized that before I could talk honestly about where I’m going, I needed to talk honestly about why I’m leaving.

    That’s what this poem is.

    It’s the part I’ve always written around instead of through.
    The part I’ve buried under tides, distance, storms, and moonlight.
    The part I’ve hinted at for years without ever saying plainly.

    The truth is simple, even if it took me a long time to say it:

    I’ve never felt at home in the country where I grew up.

    Not in childhood.
    Not in adulthood.
    Not in all the years in between.

    It’s a quiet ache—persistent, steady, familiar.
    Not dramatic, not catastrophic, just a sense of misalignment I’ve carried since I was fourteen. A feeling of being held in a place I never belonged to, waiting for a life that didn’t start here.

    I’ve called it restlessness.
    I’ve called it longing.
    I’ve called it distance.
    Eventually, I called it the ocean.

    But naming it directly felt necessary.
    Not to erase the metaphors, but to understand what they were protecting.

    This poem is that attempt.
    Not a rejection of metaphor, but a recognition of the truth beneath it.

    — Rowan Evans

    A traveler stands at the edge of a familiar neighborhood looking toward a distant horizon with a suitcase in hand.
    Sometimes leaving isn’t running away. Sometimes it’s finally walking toward the place that feels like home.

    Only Waiting (No Metaphor Left Behind)
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Turn the page,
    I’ve got more to say.

    I’ll try again
    not to hide behind
    metaphors
    and coded lines.

    Last time—
    I talked about the destination,
    the place I’m moving toward.

    This time—
    I’m going to talk about the ache.
    The persistent empty feeling
    that I’ve been feeling since I was fourteen.

    I’ve written about it before
    woven in metaphors.
    But this time I’m going to try
    and say it plain.

    It’s the ache of living in a place
    that never felt like mine.

    Not once.

    Not in childhood,
    not in adulthood,
    not in all the years in between.

    People talk about home
    like it’s a given—

    a birthplace,
    a neighborhood,
    a country that shaped them.

    But I never felt shaped by this place.

    Only held in it.
    Only waiting.

    I learned early
    that you can grow up somewhere
    and still feel like a visitor.

    You can know every street
    and still feel lost.

    You can speak the language
    and still feel unheard.

    Since fourteen,
    I’ve carried this quiet emptiness—
    not dramatic,
    not catastrophic,
    just a steady sense
    that I was meant to be somewhere else,
    and somehow ended up here instead.

    I used to call it restlessness.

    Then longing.

    Then distance.

    Then the ocean.

    But the truth is simpler:
    I’ve never felt at home
    in the country that raised me.

    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.

    [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.

    [Maybe You’ll Want Me Too]
    A poem about the subtle shift from knowing someone to constantly thinking about them. Through humor, metaphor, and confession, Maybe You’ll Want Me Too explores affection, attachment, and the fragile hope that being wanted might matter more than being needed.

    [Recognizes Home]
    A free-verse poem exploring the difference between love as dependency and love as choice. It challenges the idea that love must be need-based, instead centering the quiet strength of choosing someone while still remaining whole on your own.

    [Not Rebuilding You]
    A poem about love as an act of presence rather than rescue. Through construction imagery, Not Rebuilding You explores trust, devotion, emotional safety, and the quiet work of building a foundation strong enough for healing to grow.

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

  • Crossing the Sea (No Metaphor Left Behind) | A Poem About Relocation, Distance, and Finding Home

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem began as an experiment in restraint.

    I wanted to see what would happen if I stopped relying on metaphor—the oceans, tides, moons, and distant imagery that so often shape the way I write—and instead said things as directly as I could.

    What I discovered is that I don’t really think in a “non-metaphorical” way.

    Even when I try to remove symbolism, my mind still reaches for it. The language of distance, direction, and crossing appears naturally because that is how I process emotional states: spatially, geographically, in motion.

    So the poem became something else.

    Not an escape from metaphor, but an awareness of it.

    A recognition that even when I say “I won’t use the ocean this time,” I still understand my life through movement across it.

    This piece lives in that tension between clarity and instinct—between what I am trying to say plainly, and the language my mind naturally returns to.

    And in the end, it admits something simple:

    Sometimes the clearest way to say the truth… is still through the shape of the thing you tried to leave behind.

    — Rowan Evans

    A lone traveler stands on a Pacific shoreline looking toward distant islands across the ocean at sunrise.
    Some distances are measured in miles. Others are measured in becoming.

    Crossing the Sea (No Metaphor Left Behind)
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I am going to try
    something that terrifies me—
    that most of the time,
    would leave me paralyzed.

    I am going to try
    and say everything
    I hold inside—
    no metaphors
    to hide behind
    this time.

    I’m not where
    I want to be
    and part of me,
    thinks I’ll never be.

    I know that’s just
    fear and doubt—

    just because part of me
    thinks it, doesn’t make it true.

    Relocating
    is just taking
    longer than I wanted it to.

    But I know the direction.
    The destination is clear—
    I just got to get there.

    I got to leave here.

    This isn’t a new feeling—
    I’ve said this all before,
    buried in metaphors.

    Hidden behind symbolism.

    This is where
    I’d put the ocean
    and the tide,
    a way to describe
    the distance.

    Between where I am
    and where I want to be—
    and to get there,
    I have to cross the sea.

    Not a metaphor,
    I mean that literally—
    Pacific and the Philippine.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [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.

    [Recognizes Home]
    A free-verse poem exploring the difference between love as dependency and love as choice. It challenges the idea that love must be need-based, instead centering the quiet strength of choosing someone while still remaining whole on your own.

    [Not Rebuilding You]
    A poem about love as an act of presence rather than rescue. Through construction imagery, Not Rebuilding You explores trust, devotion, emotional safety, and the quiet work of building a foundation strong enough for healing to grow.

    [The Language Her Soul Speaks]
    What if love isn’t about being understood, but learning to understand someone else? “The Language Her Soul Speaks” is a free verse poem about intimacy, communication, curiosity, and the desire to know another person beyond the limits of language.

    [Ocean Waves (1, 4, 3)]
    A moonlit shoreline, a rowboat full of ducks, a piggybank with no cents, and a confession hidden in plain sight. Ocean Waves (1, 4, 3) explores how humor, wordplay, and absurdity can become a side door to vulnerability when the truth feels too difficult to say directly.

    [L Words & Heart]
    A playful, self-aware poem about love, longing, loyalty, and the quiet ways another person can reshape our inner world. What begins as humor slowly reveals a heartfelt confession about affection, imagination, and the faces that linger in our dreams.

    [I’ll Be There to See Your Sunrise]
    Love has never come easily to me. This poem explores the fear, vulnerability, and quiet courage required to stay emotionally present when connection begins to matter deeply. “I’ll Be There to See Your Sunrise” is about choosing love despite the risk of heartbreak—and promising to remain long enough to witness someone fully.

    [Altar and Roses]
    A gothic free verse poem about poetic identity, recurring symbolism, devotion, and the quiet humanity beneath dramatic imagery.

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

  • For the World to Remember Me Again | A Poem About Headaches, Disconnection & Finding Focus

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece began exactly where it sounds like it did:

    With a headache.

    Not a dramatic one. Not a poetic one.

    Just the kind that makes it difficult to focus. The kind where every sound feels a little sharper than it should. The kind where your thoughts stop moving cleanly and start dragging their feet.

    I sat down intending to write about that feeling.

    But somewhere along the way, the poem became less about pain and more about disconnection.

    Because what struck me wasn’t the headache itself.

    It was the strange sensation of feeling slightly removed from the world around me.

    Like reality had taken half a step backward.

    Like I was still present, but not entirely anchored.

    The images of echoes, warped thoughts, blurred edges, and slipping focus all came from trying to describe that experience as honestly as possible.

    What surprised me was where the poem ended.

    I started by writing about a physical sensation.

    I ended by writing about recognition.

    About the desire to feel fully present again.

    To feel connected to yourself, your surroundings, and the moment you’re living in.

    The title comes from that realization.

    Because sometimes discomfort doesn’t make us feel absent.

    It makes us feel forgotten.

    Not by other people, necessarily, but by the world itself.

    As though we’ve drifted just far enough away from ourselves to notice the distance.

    And all we can do is sit quietly and wait for clarity to return.

    For the world to remember us again.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary person sitting quietly with a headache as the world around them blurs and fades into soft echoes of light.
    “Some days it isn’t pain that feels overwhelming—it’s the distance between yourself and the world around you.”

    For the World to Remember Me Again
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I’ve got a headache,
    can’t see straight—
    vision blurring at the edges.

    It’s the kind of headache—
    where even the silence
    is loud.

    And I sit in it,
    this ringing hush,
    like the world has stepped back
    and left me echoing alone.

    It’s like—
    every sound echoes
    in a cavernous skull.

    Like my thoughts are ricocheting
    off the walls of me,
    coming back warped,
    a little less mine
    each time—

    the rhythm
    loses a little bit
    of its rhyme.

    Every pulse is thunder,
    every heartbeat a warning—
    a storm gathering
    behind my eyes.

    I try to focus,
    but the edges keep slipping—
    like my mind is smudging
    under its own weight.

    So I breathe,
    slow and deliberate,
    hoping the world will settle
    back into focus—

    or at least…

    stop slipping away.

    And I wait,
    quiet as I can,
    for the world
    to remember me again.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Before My Feet Touch the Floor]
    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.

    [Recognizes Home]
    A free-verse poem exploring the difference between love as dependency and love as choice. It challenges the idea that love must be need-based, instead centering the quiet strength of choosing someone while still remaining whole on your own.

    [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.

    [Not Rebuilding You]
    A poem about love as an act of presence rather than rescue. Through construction imagery, Not Rebuilding You explores trust, devotion, emotional safety, and the quiet work of building a foundation strong enough for healing to grow.

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

  • Maybe You’ll Want Me Too | A Poem About Affection, Attachment, and Being Chosen

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some poems arrive because of a grand idea.

    Others arrive because a single sentence refuses to leave.

    This was one of those.

    The poem began when I remembered a conversation. A joke, really. Someone once described themselves as being “like a drug” and we laughed about it. At the time, it felt playful, exaggerated, harmless.

    But memory has a way of revisiting things from a different angle.

    When I thought about that conversation later, I realized what interested me wasn’t the comparison itself. It was the experience of slowly realizing that someone has become part of your everyday thoughts without you noticing exactly when it happened.

    One day they’re simply someone you know.

    Then they’re someone you think about.

    Then they’re someone who quietly occupies space in your mind when nothing else is demanding your attention.

    The drug metaphor gave me a doorway into the poem, but it isn’t really what the poem is about.

    It’s about affection.

    It’s about attachment.

    It’s about the strange vulnerability of admitting that someone matters.

    More than that, it’s about the difference between being needed and being wanted.

    Need can feel transactional.

    Want feels chosen.

    The final lines became the emotional center for me because they capture a hope I think many people carry but rarely say aloud:

    Not that someone has to stay.

    Not that someone owes us their attention.

    Just that maybe, if given the choice, they would choose us too.

    Like a lot of my recent work, humor and metaphor show up first. They’re familiar territory. They’re comfortable. They make difficult things easier to approach.

    But beneath the jokes, the poem is doing what many of my poems eventually do.

    It’s confessing.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary figure standing beneath glowing city lights as colorful streams of light drift through the air, symbolizing affection, attachment, and lingering thoughts of someone special
    Sometimes affection arrives quietly—slipping into your thoughts until you realize someone has become part of your everyday world. ✨

    Maybe You’ll Want Me Too
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I remember when you said—
    you are like a drug.

    It was all laughs
    about your exes being hooked,
    still shook by the thoughts of you.

    But I was getting second-hand
    contact highs—

    now I feel addicted too.

    It’s like you’re in my bloodstream.
    You’ve rewired my brain,
    rebalanced the chemical compounds—
    you’re in nearly every single thought now.

    I try to hide it behind metaphors
    and jokes—an attempt to mask
    the fragile hope—

    that you won’t need me,
    but maybe you’ll want me too.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Recognizes Home]
    A free-verse poem exploring the difference between love as dependency and love as choice. It challenges the idea that love must be need-based, instead centering the quiet strength of choosing someone while still remaining whole on your own.

    [Not Rebuilding You]
    A poem about love as an act of presence rather than rescue. Through construction imagery, Not Rebuilding You explores trust, devotion, emotional safety, and the quiet work of building a foundation strong enough for healing to grow.

    [The Language Her Soul Speaks]
    What if love isn’t about being understood, but learning to understand someone else? “The Language Her Soul Speaks” is a free verse poem about intimacy, communication, curiosity, and the desire to know another person beyond the limits of language.

    [Ocean Waves (1, 4, 3)]
    A moonlit shoreline, a rowboat full of ducks, a piggybank with no cents, and a confession hidden in plain sight. Ocean Waves (1, 4, 3) explores how humor, wordplay, and absurdity can become a side door to vulnerability when the truth feels too difficult to say directly.

    [L Words & Heart]
    A moonlit shoreline, a rowboat full of ducks, a piggybank with no cents, and a confession hidden in plain sight. Ocean Waves (1, 4, 3) explores how humor, wordplay, and absurdity can become a side door to vulnerability when the truth feels too difficult to say directly.

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

  • Danny Phantom Theology | A Poem About Living Between Worlds and Choosing Hope

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem began with a cartoon.

    Or rather, it began with a metaphor borrowed from one.

    I’ve always been drawn to characters who exist between worlds—people who don’t fully belong in one place or another, who spend their lives navigating the space between identities, expectations, realities, and possibilities.

    When I thought about Danny Phantom, I realized the metaphor fit more than I expected.

    Not because I feel haunted.

    Not because I feel supernatural.

    But because I understand what it feels like to exist in two places at once.

    Part of me lives in the present moment—the practical world of obligations, routines, limitations, and survival.

    Another part lives somewhere else.

    A quieter place built from hope, imagination, memory, longing, possibility, and the belief that life can become more than what it currently is.

    For a long time, much of my writing has existed in the tension between those two worlds.

    The opening sections of this poem lean into that tension. They acknowledge exhaustion, frustration, and the feeling of carrying more weight than you’d like. But the poem isn’t interested in staying there.

    What matters to me is where it ends.

    Because this isn’t a poem about giving up.

    It’s a poem about wanting more from life than survival.

    About wanting a future that feels inviting instead of merely manageable.

    About believing that the light inside us isn’t meant to spend its entire existence fighting to stay alive.

    Sometimes it deserves the chance to burn because it’s excited.

    Excited about tomorrow.

    Excited about possibility.

    Excited about whatever comes next.

    Maybe that’s the real theology hidden inside the title:

    Not that we exist between worlds.

    But that we keep moving toward the one where we finally get to live.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary figure stands between a gray city and a glowing world of light and possibility, symbolizing living between survival and hope.
    Somewhere between the life we endure and the life we imagine, hope keeps the light alive.

    Danny Phantom Theology
    Poetry by Rowan Evan1s

    Sometimes I feel
    like Danny Phantom,
    a boy between worlds—
    one alive, the other
    a quiet place inside me
    where the light flickers
    but never fully goes out.

    I exist in both.
    But I do not thrive,
    most the time
    it barely feels like I’ll survive.
    I know that’s a little dramatic—
    it’s a bad habit.
    I know my words feel heavy,
    more than intended most the time.
    I know what it sounds like—
    it sounds like I don’t like life.

    But that’s not true—
    I’m a lover of life,
    a hater of the conditions.
    I want a change—
    in environment,
    in circumstance.

    I want a world
    where I don’t have to split myself
    to make it through the day,
    where the light inside me
    doesn’t flicker
    from exhaustion
    but from possibility.

    I want a life
    where survival
    isn’t the main objective.
    Where waking up
    isn’t an act of endurance,
    but anticipation.
    Where the light inside me
    doesn’t flicker
    because it’s fighting to stay alive—

    but because…

    it’s excited
    for what’s next.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Frankenstein’s Monster]
    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.

    [Lone Wolf Theology]
    A philosophical pop-culture poem exploring freedom, identity, and self-authorship through the lens of superheroes, antiheroes, mythic archetypes, and personal rebellion. A declaration of autonomy in a world determined to write your story for you.

    [Before We Created the Labels]
    Ancient gods return to a fractured world shaped by borders, identities, and separation. “Before We Created the Labels” explores humanity’s divisions through mythic imagery, sacred ritual, and symbolic collapse—asking what remains when we learn to see one another beyond labels.

    [A Heart That Echoes in Another Language]
    A poetic journey through music across Japan, Korea, China, and the Philippines, exploring how sound becomes identity, memory, and emotional geography.

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

  • The Long Way Around – A Poem About Growth, Patience, and Taking the Hard Path

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece started with a line I came across:

    “If you are in a hurry, take the long way around.”

    I don’t know where it actually comes from—but the idea stuck.

    We’re taught to move fast. To find the most direct path. To get from where we are to where we want to be as efficiently as possible.

    But some things don’t survive that kind of movement.

    Some growth only happens in the detours. In the delays. In the parts that feel unnecessary while you’re in them.

    This piece isn’t about slowing down for the sake of it.

    It’s about recognizing that sometimes, the long way isn’t a setback—

    it’s the only path that lets you arrive intact.

    — Rowan Evans

    Winding road through hills at sunset symbolizing a long and meaningful journey.
    Not quickly—but whole.

    The Long Way Around
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    If you’re in a hurry,
    go the long way ’round—
    because sometimes
    the straight line
    is the one that breaks you.

    It’s not ease
    that shapes you.

    It’s the winding roads
    that make you.

    It’s the bends,
    the breaks,
    the slow turns
    that teach you.

    It’s the corners,
    the pauses,
    the places you swore
    you’d never have to pass through.

    And somehow,
    by the time you reach the end,
    you realize
    the long way
    was the only way
    you could have survived.

    Yet still,
    you arrive—

    not quickly,
    but whole.

    The long way
    is the way
    that lasts.

    Journey into the Hexverse!

    [Where the Tide Calls Me]
    What if feeling stuck isn’t about being lost—but about resisting where you’re meant to go? Where the Tide Calls Me explores belonging, movement, and the courage to follow an unseen pull.

    [Just Before I Arrive]
    A voice calls from somewhere just out of reach. Just Before I Arrive explores the feeling of being guided through a dream toward connection—only to wake up before you get there.

    [Dreaming of Other Streets]
    What if the places that feel like home aren’t the ones you’ve lived in? This poem explores dreams, memory, and the quiet search for belonging in unfamiliar places

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

  • Where the Tide Calls Me – A Poem About Letting Go, Belonging, and Following Your Path

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    There’s a difference between feeling stuck… and being somewhere you were never meant to stay.

    For a long time, I couldn’t tell which one I was experiencing.

    It felt like I was standing still—like something in my life wasn’t moving forward, like I was waiting for a shift that never came. But the more I sat with that feeling, the more it started to change.

    It stopped feeling like stillness.

    And started feeling like resistance.

    This piece comes from that realization.

    That sometimes the discomfort isn’t because you’re lost—
    it’s because something in you is trying to move, and you haven’t let it yet.

    Not every path is meant to be walked on solid ground.

    Some of them ask you to trust the pull…
    and step into something uncertain.

    — Rowan Evans

    Person walking into the ocean at sunset symbolizing following a personal path and embracing change.
    Some of us aren’t meant to stay on land—we’re meant to follow the tide wherever it leads.

    Where the Tide Calls Me
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Do you ever feel stuck?
    Like you could stand on the ledge,
    overlooking everything
    and just scream—

    Do you ever feel
    you’re all out of luck?
    No matter how hard you try,
    it’s still a struggle to get by.

    Like the shores
    you walk,
    were never your own.

    The waves would talk,
    whispering of home.
    A land far away
    from where I was born.

    The world keeps saying
    this is where I belong,
    but the sea says otherwise.

    So I—
    wade into the waves,
    praying for better days,
    searching for a new place.

    Eyes focused.

    Ears turned
    and listening.

    I used to feel stuck—
    like the ledge was the only place
    I could breathe.

    But now,
    with the water rising around my feet,
    I finally understand:

    I was never meant
    to stand above the world
    and scream.

    I was meant
    to follow the tide.

    I walk deeper,
    letting the water rise—
    because some of us
    aren’t called
    to stay on land.

    And when the waves call—
    I answer.

    Not with fear,
    not with doubt,
    but with the quiet certainty
    that home
    is not where I started…

    but where the tide
    is pulling me.

    Journey into the Hexverse!

    [I Was Already On My Way]
    What if the places that call to you aren’t random? I Was Already On My Way explores identity, travel, and the realization that some paths have been forming long before we recognize them.

    [121° East]
    A single line of longitude becomes something more—a reflection of distance, identity, and the quiet decision to become who you were always meant to be.

    [The Quiet Inside the Noise]
    What happens when a restless mind finally quiets—not by silence, but by focusing on one person? The Quiet Inside the Noise explores love, fixation, and finding calm in connection.

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

  • I Was Already On My Way – A Poem About Identity, Travel, and Finding Your Direction

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some things don’t arrive all at once.

    They show up in fragments–small moments, passing interests, people you meet, places that linger in your thoughts longer than they should.

    At first, it feels random.

    Disconnected.

    But over time, patterns start to form.

    This piece comes from recognizing one of those patterns.

    Looking back and realizing that what felt like curiosity… was actually direction. That the pull I kept feeling wasn’t new–it was something that had been building quietly for years.

    And maybe that’s what alignment feels like.

    Not a sudden shift.

    But a slow realization that you’ve been moving toward something long before you understood why.

    — Rowan Evans

    Person standing at a crossroads with signs pointing toward distant cities symbolizing life direction and travel.
    Some paths don’t begin when you choose them—they’ve been forming long before you realize you’re on them.

    They say—
    you’re an American,
    you can’t change it.
    It runs through the blood,
    burrows in the marrow.
    You’re an American today,
    you’ll be one tomorrow.

    Sure—
    that’s true.

    American is the label
    I wear.

    But it’s not the one
    I claim.

    These are the lands
    I was born in—
    but they’ve never
    been home.

    I’ve known
    since I was fourteen
    I was meant
    to leave.

    Started planning
    at seventeen.

    Eighteen—
    applied for a job
    in Japan.

    I pictured
    walking Tokyo’s streets,
    slipping through alleyways—

    a quiet life
    in a city alive.

    Nineteen—
    felt the pull
    of Korea,
    the hum of Seoul
    in my soul.

    Twenty—
    I wandered China
    in my mind.

    But it never felt
    quite right.

    So I kept searching,
    listening
    to the shifts
    inside.

    And then—

    a pattern emerged.

    I didn’t notice it
    at first.

    Manila.
    The Philippines.

    A thread
    that’s been there
    since I was eighteen.

    Subtle—
    at the start.

    Two kids
    I took
    under my wing.

    That’s how it began.

    And then it kept appearing—
    in the friends
    I met online,

    in the people
    I was drawn to.

    It felt like
    a magnetic pull.

    In the last year—
    maybe more—

    it’s become stronger
    than ever before.

    And somewhere
    in that pull—

    is her.

    Not the reason—

    but proof

    that I was already
    on my way.

    This doesn’t feel
    like curiosity anymore.

    It feels like alignment.

    Like something in me
    has been pointing
    in one direction
    all along—

    and I’m only now
    choosing
    to follow it.

    Journey into the Hexverse!

    [121° East]
    A single line of longitude becomes something more—a reflection of distance, identity, and the quiet decision to become who you were always meant to be.

    [Coordinated of Escape]
    A deeply introspective poem about overthinking, emotional loops, and the desire to start over. Coordinates of Escape traces the journey from internal chaos to a deliberate destination—both physical and personal.

    [Of No Single Nation]
    What if belonging isn’t tied to where you’re from? Of No Single Nation explores identity beyond borders, reframing home as something found in connection rather than geography.

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

  • Weathered – A Poem About Growth, Fear, and Facing Yourself

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Weathered lives in the spaces between awareness and change.

    It’s easy to recognize patterns in ourselves–the ways we retreat, the ways we protect, the ways we leave before we can be left. It’s harder to sit with them. Harder still to change them.

    This piece isn’t about having the answers. It’s about standing in the storm anyway. Letting it hit, letting it string things back, and choosing not to run from it.

    Growth doesn’t always feel like progress.
    Sometimes it just feels like staying.

    — Rowan Evans

    A person standing in the rain facing a storm, symbolizing emotional endurance and personal growth
    Sometimes growth looks like standing still in the storm.

    Weathered
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I sit alone,
    asking questions—
    why am I like this?
    Why do I retreat
    inside my mind,
    when it’s you
    I’m trying to find?

    I mean—
    I know it’s because
    you mean too much
    to me.

    So I panic.

    I move inward,
    closing shutters
    to the world.

    I don’t want you
    to see me—
    not like this,
    not when you
    can perceive me.

    Because to be perceived
    for me,
    is to be left behind.
    It’s happened
    more than one time.

    So I leave first.
    I leave before it hurts.

    Again I ask—
    why am I like this?
    Why can’t I fight this?

    I just want to shake it,
    stop feeling like a mistake,
    be better.
    But better doesn’t seem
    to be in the cards for me…

    So I’ve got to learn.
    I’ve got to change
    some things—

    I need to pull myself
    back together,
    because this—

    this is a storm.
    A storm I want to stand in,
    feel the wind batter me,
    let the rain strip me bare,
    and still—
    I will weather it.

    Journey into the Hexverse

    [To Whom It May Concern…] (3/20)
    A raw exploration of vulnerability, fear, and self-sabotage—this poem captures the struggle between wanting to be seen and the instinct to hide.

    [Same Room (Emotionally)] (3/22)
    Can you miss someone you’ve never met? This poem explores emotional connection beyond physical distance and what it means to truly feel seen.

    [No Parachute] (3/23)
    A poetic reflection on falling in love without hesitation—raw, uncertain, and without a safety net.

    [When I Started to Fall for You] (3/24)
    A lyrical exploration of love’s intensity—how connection grows, transforms, and reshapes the way we experience the world.

    [Bad Habit] (3/25)
    A powerful reflection on repetitive thought patterns, emotional loops, and the moment of realizing you’re stuck inside your own mind.

    [Same Sky] (3/26)
    A poetic meditation on longing, distance, and the quiet desire to share the same space—even when worlds apart.

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