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Poetry by Rowan Evans

Tag: Poetry

  • Distant Shores | A Poem About Longing, Growth, and Becoming

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem came from a recurring dream and a familiar pull — the quiet urge to move toward something that feels meaningful, even if the destination isn’t fully defined yet. It isn’t about a place so much as the feeling of possibility, of momentum returning, of wanting to grow into someone worthy of the journey ahead.

    Some shores are literal.
    Some are emotional.
    Some only exist because someone made you believe they might.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary figure standing on a quiet shoreline at dawn, looking out toward distant waves and a glowing horizon.
    Some journeys begin long before you ever leave—when the shore starts calling you back to yourself.

    Distant Shores
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    It’s kind of wild how,
    you’ve been in my dreams
    for a while now.

    You’re always radiant as ever,
    you look like heaven—but better.
    You inspire every poem, word and letter,
    I write them with love, respect and care.
    If I could, I would always be there—

    I swear
    I will cross oceans,
    whether I catch a jet,
    swim or stowaway.
    I swear
    I will cross these waves,
    and we will walk the same shore
    some day.
    I swear—

    You make me, want to be
    a better me.
    To strive for more,
    instead of giving up
    like I had before.
    I had allowed myself
    to become trapped,
    inside the borders
    of my mind and
    country.

    You added fuel to a fire
    that had been silently burning.
    Right there, inside my chest.
    The embers smoldered in silence,
    until you, and the fire reignited—
    and now it roars.

    Once again, I dream of walking
    distant shores. But now…
    Now, I want them to be…

    Yours.

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

    Journey into the Hexverse

    [Toward Somewhere I Can Breathe]
    A poem about feeling disconnected since fourteen, longing for somewhere that feels like home, and finally understanding that the journey isn’t about escape — it’s about alignment.

    [Disconnected Since Fourteen]
    A confessional poem about growing up disconnected—from place, from home, from belonging—and the quiet realization that the signal was never stable to begin with.

    [Still Tilting Elsewhere]
    A reflection on growing up with a compass that never pointed home—tracing the quiet rebellion of longing, the patience of dreams, and the feeling of always being angled toward somewhere else.

  • Fancy Footwork: A Poem About Craft, Instinct, and Creative Precision

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem is about muscle memory.

    Not the physical kind, but the kind you build over years of showing up — writing through doubt, through silence, through the versions of yourself that didn’t yet know how strong they were becoming.

    Fancy Footwork uses boxing as metaphor, but the real fight happens on the page and in the mind. Every dodge, every feint, every combination comes from long preparation — from learning how to move with intention instead of panic.

    This isn’t bravado. It’s recognition.

    Twenty-three years of practice doesn’t look like luck. It looks like instinct.

    — Rowan Evans

    An abstract illustration of a poet-boxer formed from ink, mid-movement, symbolizing writing as a disciplined and practiced art.
    Writing is muscle memory — every move learned, every strike intentional.

    Fancy Footwork
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    When I put pen to paper,
    my ink becomes a cage
    on the page
    the way I write bars.

    Yeah, my ink flows—
    it floats
    like a butterfly,
    stings like a bee.

    Hit you with that
    one, two and three.
    Right jab, left hook—
    followed by an uppercut.

    It’s fancy footwork,
    the way my ink glides
    and slides across the page.
    It’s a dance,
    choreographed—
    every line precise.

    I duck,
    slip, dodge
    and throw a feint.
    Misdirect,
    then change direction,
    onslaught,
    raining fists.

    Watching everyone
    that considers themselves
    opposition—
    losing their minds,
    as I
    continue to gain
    position.

    They aren’t even
    competition.
    Nobody will
    stop me
    on my ascension.

    Eyes focused
    on the mission.

    I will climb the ladder
    one rung at a time.
    Watch my ranking rise,
    win after win,
    fight after fight—
    see the smile on my face?
    This is
    my championship chase,
    I will claim
    the top place.

    I’ve been preparing for this
    for twenty-three years.
    Shadowboxing
    inside the lines,
    it was me
    versus my mind.

    I was—
    hitting the gym,
    testing reflexes
    building the instinct,
    to move
    the way poetry flows.

    Movement so quick,
    I hit like a flash—
    every jab,
    lands like prose.

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

  • Back to Darkseid — A Poem About Chaos, Identity, and the Mind

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem started as play.

    I wasn’t trying to be deep or careful — I was letting my brain sprint, letting pop culture, mythology, and intrusive thoughts collide on the page. Comics, villains, alter egos, masks — all the familiar metaphors we use when our minds feel too loud to live in quietly.

    What surprised me wasn’t the darkness, but the balance. This isn’t a descent — it’s a return with awareness. Standing in the light doesn’t mean pretending the shadows don’t exist. It means no longer fearing them.

    This is what it feels like when poetry stops being a tool and starts being a force — when the ink takes over, and you let it.

    Surreal illustration of a figure in shadow with ink tendrils rising up their spine, symbolizing chaos, identity, and creative obsession.
    Where chaos, identity, and ink collide.

    Back to Darkseid
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I walk in,
    ready to rock
    like a shock
    to the system.

    Watch me
    ghost ride the whip,
    hit you with the
    penance stare.

    Watch as you become
    hyper aware
    of every misdeed,
    and every sin seeps
    into the veins.

    It circulates
    until it hits
    the brain.

    Lights out.

    Silence.

    My noggin’s
    an asylum,
    I’m sick in the head.
    Coin flip of fate,
    I’m two-faced
    with my joker’s thoughts.

    I’m a dark knight,
    on a dark night—
    fighting the monsters
    that my mind creates.

    Don’t try to figure me out.
    I’m an enigma, a riddle
    with no answer.

    A twisted harlequin
    in a garden
    made by Ivy.
    Each petal unfurls,
    guiding—
    leading me back
    from the edge.

    Now I’m standing in the light,
    back to Darkseid—
    I no longer fear
    Apocalypse.

    Watch my ink
    twist into tendrils.
    Watch as they
    wrap around,
    and creep up
    my spine like venom.
    Watch as poetry
    slowly,
    takes over
    my mind.

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

  • Alchemist of Ink (All Sixes) – A Poem About Turning Pain Into Power

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some poems are confessions.
    Some are exorcisms.

    This one is alchemy.

    Alchemist of Ink (All Sixes) came from that familiar edge—when the weight presses in, when the mind contracts, when the darkness feels like it might finally win. But instead of letting it consume me, I let it become something. I let it turn into ink.

    This poem is about that moment of reclamation.
    About taking what hurts and making it mine.
    About refusing to be only what the darkness names me.

    If you’ve ever felt yourself folding inward—this is for you.
    If you’ve ever made art out of survival—this is yours too.

    A shadowed poet with glowing eyes as black ink pours from their hands, transforming into swirling symbols of power in a dark, gothic setting.
    Turning darkness into language. Pain into power. Ink into alchemy.

    Alchemist of Ink (All Sixes)
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I am all sixes when its needed,
    this darkness,
    your hatred feeds it.

    I can feel it—
    crawling up my spine,
    that creeping feeling.
    It twists around my mind,
    contracting.

    I can feel it squeeze,
    as I fall to knees.

    My eyes flicker and flash,
    fade to black—
    as you see
    my face distort.
    Twisted reflection.
    Personified depression.

    Can you see—
    as I begin to bleed ink?
    It pours from me,
    covering fingers,
    hands and arms.

    It twists,
    never relents.

    …

    I’m a motherfucking
    alchemist,
    the way I take my pain
    and change it.
    I’ll write like hell,
    to subtly rearrange it.

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

  • Depths – A Poem About Writing, Survival, and the Fear of Feeling

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem isn’t about skill.
    It’s about orientation.

    Some people write to be understood.
    Some people write because silence feels lethal.

    This piece is for the ones who learned to live in the deep—
    who didn’t choose intensity so much as need it to breathe.

    It isn’t an accusation.
    It’s a recognition.

    Not everyone was taught that the ocean is real.

    A figure breathing underwater in deep blue ocean light, symbolizing emotional depth and survival.
    Some of us learned to breathe underwater.

    Depths
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I write
    like I might
    die, if I don’t.

    You write
    like you’re trying
    to pen
    the perfect quote.

    We are not the same.

    But you
    are not to blame.
    It’s not on you
    to carry
    society’s shame.

    They went shallow,
    and punished the depths.

    Closing Note

    Some of us learned
    to breathe underwater.

    Some of us
    were told
    the ocean
    was a lie.

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

  • Etched in Memory | A Poem About Restraint, Truth, and the Weight of Words

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem came from the space between impulse and consequence—the moment when truth is sharp enough to wound, and restraint becomes a form of survival. Etched in Memory is about knowing exactly how much damage your words can do, and choosing silence not because you are wrong, but because you are precise.

    Some of us learn early that a look can say too much, that honesty—when fully unleashed—doesn’t fade. It marks. It lingers. It becomes permanent.

    This piece is a quiet confession of power held back, of violence softened into poetry, of restraint learned the hard way. Not because the truth wasn’t there—but because it would have lasted.

    — Rowan Evans

    A shadowed figure looking away as dark ink bleeds from their eyes, symbolizing restraint, silence, and words etched into memory.
    Some truths don’t need to be spoken to be permanent.

    Etched in Memory
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    My eyes learned restraint—
    before my mouth ever did.
    So I wouldn’t betray myself
    when I talked my shit.

    It was all—
    facts (fax), no printer.
    I did not
    speak a lie.

    But I
    would try
    not to speak at all.

    Because my eyes
    learned restraint—
    before my mouth ever did.

    Yet, they would
    always
    push me.

    Until…

    I would
    poetically
    dissect them—

    methodically
    dismember,
    until they
    remember.
    My words
    etched
    in memory.

    But my eyes
    learned restraint—
    before my mouth ever did.

    So I look away…

    to stop this shit.

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

  • How You Take Your Silence | A Poem About Quiet, Intimacy, and What We Hide

    Rowan Evans

    I’m less interested in what people show the world
    than in what they carry when no one is asking.

    I’ve learned that silence has weight.

    Soft light filtering through sheer curtains in a quiet room, creating a calm and intimate atmosphere
    Silence has its own weight.

    How You Take Your Silence
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I want to go beneath the surface—
    to see the substance,
    where true beauty lives.

    Don’t tell me how you take your coffee:
    tell me how you take your silence.

    I want to see the things
    you’ve been taught to hide:
    the tremor beneath your laughter,
    the cracks in the walls
    where light leaks through,
    the fingerprints of your fears
    pressed into the corners of your mind.

    The corners where your smile falters,
    the shadows that dance behind your eyes,
    the way your hands betray the calm
    you wear like armor.

    I want to trace the maps
    of the roads you walked alone,
    I want to know the weight
    of your quiet—

    I want to see how it shaped you,
    how it made you
    the whole of you.

    Author’s Note

    Silence has its own language.
    I’m still learning how to listen.

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

  • Between Worlds – A Poem About Mental Illness, Identity & Survival | Rowan Evans

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece is the closest I’ve come to writing the truth of my internal war without softening it. Between Worlds is about self-violence—the way the mind learns your weak spots, remembers the old wounds, and knows exactly where to cut. It’s a poem about relapse, about memory, about survival, and about the strange loneliness that follows healing.

    It speaks to the years where I wasn’t sure I’d make it. The hospital walls. The padded quiet. The fluorescent lights humming through the silence. It speaks to dissociation, to identity, to queerness, and to the mythic distance I’ve always felt between who I am and the world I live in.

    This poem isn’t a cry for help—it’s a record of survival. It isn’t tragedy for tragedy’s sake—it’s truth. It’s the reality that healing isn’t linear, that progress has shadows, and that sometimes the loudest battles are fought in the mind no one else can see.

    If you know this feeling—of standing in your own skin like it never quite fits, of fighting thoughts with thoughts, of loving your existence even when you question your place in it—then I hope you feel seen here.

    Because none of us are alone in the in-between.

    — Rowan Evans

    Nonbinary person standing between a hospital hallway and a star-filled night sky, symbolizing dissociation and identity between worlds.
    Between Worlds — artwork representing Rowan Evans’ poem about surviving mental illness, dissociation, and identity beyond binaries.

    Between Worlds
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Why do I
    always try
    to pick a fight
    with me?

    You’d think I’d know,
    by now, just how
    quick I’ll slip
    an insult
    under the ribs.

    I’ll hit
    every single fear,
    twist them
    like a knife—
    until I’m
    on my knees,
    gasping,
    spitting blood.

    I don’t fight fair.
    I target old wounds,
    tear at what’s
    already healed.
    I’ll fuck around
    and send myself
    back ten years—
    back to hospital walls
    and quiet rooms,
    where the only sound
    was the fluorescent hum.

    Where time dissolved…
    where clocks stopped
    ticking.

    But I walked out
    of those halls—
    didn’t I?

    Didn’t I?

    But what if I didn’t?
    What if I’m still locked inside,
    in a padded room
    with the jacket
    strapped tight?
    Thoughts confined,
    so the words
    won’t escape.

    Writing poems
    in my head,
    just to pass
    the time.

    I’ve been alive,
    but dead inside.
    And I’ll be honest:
    I’ve died
    inside my mind
    more than
    a dozen times.

    I just wanted escape.

    Escape from pain,
    from feeling misplaced—
    I just wanted
    to belong.

    But it’s like—
    something is wrong here.
    Why don’t I
    feel like
    I belong here?

    Why does everything feel
    a half inch to the left—
    like I’m living inside
    the echo of myself?

    Like I’m watching my life
    from behind fogged glass,
    palms against the surface,
    screaming—
    but no sound
    passes through.

    Sometimes I swear
    the world forgets I’m here,
    and sometimes
    I do too.

    Maybe it’s because
    every room I walk into,
    I’m half a ghost already—
    too queer, too quiet,
    too soft, too strange.
    Too fucking much
    for everyone
    but me.

    Maybe that’s why
    the fight never ends—
    because I’m still trying
    to prove I deserve
    the space I take up,
    even in my own skin.

    So maybe I don’t belong here
    because I was born
    between worlds—
    not alive, not dead,
    not human, not myth,
    not safe, not ruined.

    Maybe my bones remember
    a home I never had,
    and every heartbeat since
    has been an attempt
    to map
    my way back.

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

  • Fragile Pulse — A Poem About Finding Humanity Beneath the Machinery | Rowan Evans

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Fragile Pulse came from watching the world move on autopilot—how easily people slip into routines, expectations, and identities that aren’t truly their own. It’s a poem about alienation, yes, but also about the quiet, stubborn spark that still lives beneath all that machinery.

    This piece is my reminder that even in places that feel lifeless or mechanical, there are moments of real humanity—small flickers of authenticity that reach back when we reach out. It’s about connection in a world that often forgets how to feel, and about what it means to notice the spark in someone who thought theirs had gone out.

    A fragile pulse is still a pulse. And sometimes, that’s enough to change everything.

    Illustration of a single glowing human figure surrounded by robotic, mechanical figures moving in a cold, dystopian cityscape.
    A fragile spark in a mechanical world — the pulse that refuses to fade.

    Fragile Pulse
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Oh, you’re here?

    Do you hear that?

    Listen—
    the hum of motors,
    the whir of gears.
    You see a land of people;
    I see a land of robots—
    not thinking,
    only following programs.

    They walk past you,
    faces blank,
    eyes fixed,
    hands moving in repetition,
    hearts forgotten in the chest,
    souls traded for schedules.

    And I watch—
    not with hope,
    not with judgment,
    but with quiet fascination
    at how easily the mind bends
    when freedom is a stranger.

    Do you hear it too?
    The faint pulse beneath the circuits,
    the tiny spark of something
    that refuses to be programmed.
    It’s fragile—
    like a candle in a storm,
    but it exists.
    I can feel it,
    even if the rest cannot.

    I reach out—
    not with force,
    not with commands,
    but with a touch gentle enough
    to tremble against wires and bone.

    Some notice;
    some do not,
    but the ones who do
    flicker for a moment—
    a shadow of thought
    breaking through the rhythm
    of their programming.

    And in that flicker,
    I see the impossible:
    a memory, a desire,
    a pulse that answers mine.
    A whisper shared
    between what is alive
    and what has almost forgotten how.

    Maybe it’s nothing,
    just a flicker in the dark,
    but even a single spark
    can set a world alight.
    I hold it close—
    this fragile pulse—
    and for a heartbeat,
    the land of robots
    becomes a land of us.

    If you enjoyed this piece, check out my full archive here: [The Library of Ashes]

  • Her Story – A Poem About Insecurity, Possessiveness & Honoring a Woman’s Past

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Her Story was born from frustration — not with women, but with the men who turn a woman’s past into a personal insult. This poem confronts the insecurity, entitlement, and emotional immaturity that drive so many men to treat a woman’s history like a threat instead of a testament to her strength.

    This piece isn’t about blame; it’s about perspective. A woman’s story is not a competition, not a purity test, not a battlefield for fragile egos. It is something to honor — not to resent.

    I wrote this to challenge that mindset, to hold a mirror to possessiveness disguised as devotion, and to remind anyone who needs to hear it that a woman owes no one an apology for having lived before you. She owes no one her silence. She owes no one her shame. She owes you nothing.

    — Rowan Evans

    Illustration of a woman in profile with handwritten text layered inside her silhouette and a warm halo of light behind her, representing her past and resilience.
    A woman’s story is not a threat — it’s something to honor.

    Her Story
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Why do some guys
    get so hung up on the past?
    Why do you care so much,
    what happened before you?
    So what she’s lived a life before—
    oh no, someone wanted to make her their wife before.
    I’m so jealous, watch me act out, get hellish.
    Nah, I’m just playin’, just joking around—
    Because it’s not about the past for me,
    getting that hung up on her before…
    that’s blasphemy.

    So if you can, answer me this…
    why do so many guys get pissed?
    Yeah, she has experiences—
    that you can’t touch.
    They happened before you,
    why let them affect you so much?

    Why does her story
    feel like a threat
    instead of a lesson
    that she’s survived,
    lived, loved, lost—
    and still chose you
    in this moment?

    Why does her story
    make you small,
    when it should make you honored
    to be part of the chapter
    she won’t have to rewrite?

    Why do you police her scars
    as if she owes you
    purity, silence,
    a spotless record
    to soothe your ego?

    You want devotion
    but shudder at evidence
    that she lived
    before your shadow
    ever touched her skin.

    But here’s the truth:
    A woman with a past
    isn’t a warning label—
    she’s a masterpiece
    restoring herself.
    And if that scares you,
    it’s not her history
    you’re terrified of—
    it’s your own reflection.

    It’s because you don’t feel worth—
    the attention, or affection.
    You don’t feel like you
    can handle her truth.
    You can’t honor what she’s been through,
    so it weighs on you, and it weighs heavy.
    You do what you can to
    try and prove
    you’re ready.

    But you’re not.
    You’re just like every other guy,
    sitting back, asking why?
    Why not me?
    I’ve been,
    nice as can be.
    Sounding like she owes you something,
    but the truth is—
    She owes you nothing.

    If you enjoyed Her Story, you can feel free to explore The Library of Ashes…