←

Poetry by Rowan Evans

Tag: Poetry

  • Conductor | A Poem About the Power of Words and Breath by Rowan Evans

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    There are poems that ask you to listen.

    There are poems that ask you to feel.

    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

    A mysterious conductor directs floating pages and strands of ink through a dark, empty concert hall.
    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.

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

  • No Stupid Questions — A Poem About Listening, Curiosity & Frustration

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Sometimes a poem doesn’t need to be profound.

    Sometimes it just needs to say, “Please fucking listen.”

    No Stupid Questions came from that particular kind of frustration—the kind that happens when someone asks something that has already been answered, interrupts the flow of a conversation, or throws a question into the room without stopping to consider whether the information they want is already sitting right in front of them.

    The old saying goes, “There are no stupid questions.”

    I don’t completely agree.

    Questions aren’t inherently stupid. Curiosity is valuable, and asking for clarification is often exactly what we should do. But there is a difference between genuinely wanting to understand something and simply asking whatever crosses your mind without listening to what was already said.

    This poem is intentionally blunt because the frustration is blunt.

    It’s conversational, a little sarcastic, and unapologetically irritated. There are times when I want my poetry to dress an idea in metaphor and symbolism. Other times, I just want to point at the problem and say exactly what I mean.

    No metaphor.

    No elaborate mythology.

    No moon, tide, raven, or rose to hide behind.

    Just:

    You already got your answer.

    Listen.

    — Rowan Evans

    P.S. – The end of this piece is entirely a joke.

    A writer at a desk surrounded by chaotic question marks while a clear answer sits untouched in an open notebook.

    No Stupid Questions
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    You know—

    the person that said,
    “there’s no such thing
    as a stupid question,”—

    probably asked a lot
    of stupid questions,
    just like you—

    Not trying to be rude
    or give attitude—

    but dude,
    you asked that question
    out of the blue.

    (And it was dumb,
    it was a stupid question…
    I had to break the flow to tell you,
    you asked a stupid question.)

    I already told you—

    I already answered back,
    if you need the information
    then listen—I already gave you that.

    Do you even think
    before you speak,
    or do you just
    let your thoughts fly?

    You don’t have to ask
    every question
    that comes to mind.

    I don’t care
    if you are a child.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [You Are Perfect]
    A gentle reminder that your worth isn’t determined by your flaws or by the opinions of others. You Are Perfect is a poem about resilience, self-acceptance, and standing tall even when the world tries to make you feel small.

    [Human Rorschach]
    Sometimes we’re less a fixed person than an inkblot—our meaning changing with every set of eyes that looks at us. Human Rorschach explores perception, identity, and the ways our own experiences shape what we believe we see in others.

    [A Rose in the Ashes]
    Lost within a forest where every leaf becomes a memory, the speaker follows darkness instead of fleeing from it, discovering that healing isn’t found at the end of the tunnel—but in facing the past long enough to notice a single rose blooming through the ashes.

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

  • Pull the Lever — Poetry, Hip-Hop, Cadence & the Music That Shaped Rowan Evans

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    I’ve written before about how much Hip-Hop shaped the way I write, but Pull the Lever is a little more personal about that history.

    I got into Hip-Hop young—around nine years old—and artists like DMX, Eminem, Ludacris, Mystikal, and 2Pac became part of the musical landscape I grew up in. I wasn’t trying to become a rapper; I was learning cadence. I was listening to how words moved, how syllables landed, how rhythm could turn language into something physical.

    That influence never really left.

    As I got older, though, my musical world expanded beyond American Hip-Hop. I started listening to music in other languages, and eventually Korean Hip-Hop became part of that landscape too. The final section of this poem deliberately crosses that bridge: Outsider, MC Sniper, and Drunken Tiger are Korean Hip-Hop references, following the line about me mentally crossing the sea.

    There’s something fitting about that progression. The kid who learned cadence from American Rap eventually became a writer whose relationship with rhythm stretched far beyond one language, one country, or one genre.

    I may write poetry, but the rapper’s mind is still wired into the pen.

    — Rowan Evans

    A notebook and pen surrounded by Hip-Hop imagery, transitioning from an American cityscape into a Korean night skyline, with subtle tiger and rhythmic sound motifs.
    From American Rap to Korean Hip-Hop, the rhythm stayed with me—the cadence simply crossed the sea.

    Pull the Lever
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Pull the lever to find out
    what the cow says—

    The cow says, “move bitch,
    get out the way”—
    like Ludacris and Mystikal,
    don’t piss me off,
    my shit gets mythical.

    I was nine,
    memorizing every line
    that DMX spit—
    like the Ruff Ryders Anthem,
    that was my shit.

    I learned the cadence from Em,
    so when I spit, I spit like Slim—
    not a rapper, just a writer
    with a rapper’s mind wired in.

    I got into Hip-Hop
    the same year
    we lost Pac—
    that was ’96,
    in case you forgot.

    And in my teens,
    I took my love for the game
    and mentally
    crossed the sea—

    I was an outsider,
    so I found the Outsider
    that spoke to me.

    And I studied religiously—
    until my lines hit
    with the precision of a Sniper.

    Hit the bars too hard,
    got my Tiger’s heart
    feeling like a Drunken master.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Slim & Shady Series]

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

  • Leave No Self Behind | A Poem About Healing, Memory & Self-Acceptance

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem grew out of a realization that getting “lost” isn’t always the same as losing yourself.

    I’ve written many pieces about dreams, memory, shifting landscapes, and wandering through places that seem to exist somewhere between reality and imagination. Over time, I realized those places weren’t asking me to escape who I was—they were asking me to revisit the parts of myself I had left behind.

    We often talk about “finding ourselves” as though there’s one true version waiting to be discovered. My experience has been almost the opposite. Every season of life leaves behind another version of us: the frightened one, the hopeful one, the grieving one, the joyful one. None of them disappear simply because we’ve grown older.

    Healing, at least for me, isn’t replacing those earlier selves.

    It’s learning to walk beside them without shame.

    This poem is an invitation to stop treating old versions of ourselves as mistakes to erase and instead see them as companions who helped us survive long enough to become who we are today.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary figure walking through a dreamlike hallway where each open doorway reveals a different landscape representing memories and past versions of the self.
    Healing isn’t finding one true self—it’s learning to walk beside every version of yourself with compassion.

    Leave No Self Behind
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I feel like I’ve lost myself again—
    don’t know when it began,
    but I get lost a lot.

    It doesn’t take much for me
    to get lost in thought—

    I wander off
    without meaning to,
    slipping between memories
    like loose floorboards.

    One thought opens a door,
    another pulls me down a hallway,
    and suddenly I’m somewhere
    I didn’t plan to be—

    with some version of me
    I didn’t plan to meet.

    Sometimes the hallway
    tilts into something else—

    a shoreline I’ve walked in sleep,
    a city humming with heat,
    a room I haven’t entered in years.

    The world shifts
    without warning,
    and I follow it
    the way I follow dreams—

    half-aware,
    half-afraid
    of what I’ll find
    in the scene change.

    I never know
    which version of me
    I’ll find in those places—

    the one who’s tired,
    the one who’s trying,
    the one who’s still carrying
    things I swore I let go.

    Sometimes I meet
    the versions of me
    I thought I’d outgrown—

    the one who flinches,
    the one who freezes,
    the one who still thinks
    they’re hard to love.

    And I walk with them
    for a while,
    through whatever memory
    the hallway decides to show—

    letting them speak,
    letting them breathe,
    letting them…

    exist.

    Without rushing them back
    into the dark.

    And maybe that’s
    what finding myself
    really looks like—

    not a single moment
    of clarity,
    not a sudden return,
    but walking through
    every hallway
    my mind opens,
    meeting every version
    I’ve ever been,
    and letting them stay
    long enough
    to feel seen.

    Maybe I’m not lost.

    Maybe I’m just learning
    how to carry
    all the selves
    I used to abandon
    when the world
    felt too loud.

    Maybe this time…

    I won’t leave anyone—

    behind.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Where the Metaphors Lead]
    Some truths are easier to write than they are to say aloud. “Where the Metaphors Lead” explores the quiet space between dreams, confession, and the courage it takes to let another person know how deeply they’ve become woven into your inner world.

    [Noon Is Loud]
    If four in the morning belongs to truth, then noon belongs to impossible memories. Noon Is Loud is a playful free verse poem filled with absurd boasts, pop culture references, and tongue-in-cheek mythology that explores how easily imagination can rewrite reality.

    [5:01 (Pull the Punchline Back)]
    What happens when a confessional poet instinctively hides every confession behind a joke? 5:01 (Pull the Punchline Back) explores humor as emotional armor, the speed of an overactive mind, and the difficult choice between making people laugh and letting them see what’s really there.

    [Chemical X]
    Chemical X explores the rapid, associative way one creative mind moves—from cartoons to sports, comic books to music—revealing that inspiration isn’t linear, but a collision of memory, humor, rhythm, and intuition.

    [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.

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

  • Where the Metaphors Lead | A Confessional Poem About Love, Dreams & Finding Your Voice

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some poems begin with an idea. Others begin with a feeling that refuses to leave.

    This one was written in the early hours of the morning, during that familiar stretch of time when the world grows quiet enough for my thoughts to become louder than everything else.

    I’ve always found it easier to write than to speak. Conversations ask for immediate answers. Poetry allows me to sit with a feeling until I understand it well enough to translate it into language.

    Many of the recurring images throughout my recent work—the moon, the tide, distant shores, dreams, and city streets—have become a personal symbolic language. They aren’t separate subjects anymore. They all point toward the same emotional center.

    This poem finally acknowledges that.

    Sometimes the metaphors aren’t hiding anything.

    Sometimes they’re quietly leading us back to the truth we were trying not to say.

    — Rowan Evans

    A lone writer journaling by moonlight at four in the morning while the moon reflects across a calm ocean beyond the window.
    Some feelings only find their voice after midnight, where dreams, memory, and metaphor become impossible to tell apart.

    Where the Metaphors Lead
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    It’s funny how I find myself here again,
    four AM—it’s just me, the music and my pen.
    I’ve got so many thoughts with so much to say,
    my lips move but no sound comes—
    like I lost one voice, when I found the other.

    And it’s not that I can’t speak—

    it’s just that words don’t come easily,
    when they try to come verbally.

    But on the page,
    everything lines up—

    the thoughts, the feelings,
    the things I never say out loud.
    Ink doesn’t trip over itself
    the way my voice does.

    So here are a few
    truths for you—

    there is a woman
    she is on my mind constantly,
    yeah, she is simultaneously
    the easiest and hardest to talk to.

    She makes me feel like I can be me—
    completely.

    And honestly,
    I’ve never really had that
    with anybody else—

    every beautiful line I write
    about the moon in the sky,
    the ocean and tide—

    yeah, most of the time
    it leads back to her
    in my mind.

    And every dream, I translate in ink—
    the shores I walk in sleep,
    secrets I try not to keep,
    even when it’s hard to speak—

    I lay them on the page and pray
    that they’ll reach their destination one day.

    So I sit here,
    four AM again,
    writing the things
    I can’t say out loud—

    hoping one day
    I’ll find the courage
    to speak them aloud.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [The World Shifted Around Us]
    The world transformed around us—beach, city streets, jungle—but we never moved. Sometimes love isn’t found in words, but in the quiet certainty of someone remaining clear while everything else fades.

    [Every Night, The Same Flight]
    Every night begins with the same flight. Between wakefulness and sleep, an airport appears, a familiar shoreline waits beyond the journey, and the same dream asks whether some destinations find us before we’re ready to find them.

    [Where I Belonged]
    A bedroom becomes an airport in the space between sleep and waking. Where I Belonged explores liminal consciousness, uncertainty, and the strange moments when reality feels suspended between two worlds

    [Opposites Coasts of the Same Silence]
    What separates two people isn’t always an ocean. Sometimes it’s the silence between everything left unsaid. Opposite Coasts of the Same Silence explores longing, distance, dreams, and the quiet hope that even across impossible divides, someone might still hear your voice.

    [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.

    [Call of the Tide]
    A poem about identity, displacement, and the quiet pull toward something beyond the shoreline you were born on. Sometimes the tide calls louder than the anthem.

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

  • Let Shuffle Steer | A Poem About Music, Emotion & Self-Discovery

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some people use shuffle as background noise.

    I use it as a compass.

    I’ve noticed over the years that when I stop trying to control what song comes next and simply let the algorithm decide, the music often mirrors something I was already feeling—or something I hadn’t admitted I was feeling yet.

    One song can pull me inward. Another can make me laugh. Another can unlock a memory I hadn’t thought about in years. It’s less about the songs themselves and more about how music has always been one of the languages my mind speaks most fluently.

    This poem isn’t really about playlists.

    It’s about trust.

    Trusting art to take me somewhere I didn’t expect to go, and accepting that sometimes the best way to understand myself is to stop choosing the destination and simply listen.

    — Rowan Evans

    A person wearing headphones sits beneath a night sky as glowing soundwaves wrap around them like a chrysalis, transforming into butterflies while surreal landscapes fade into one another.
    Sometimes the best guide isn’t a map—it’s the next song that shuffle decides you need.

    Let Shuffle Steer
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I sit—
    lost in my head again,
    letting the music hit.
    It carries me
    from one emotion
    to the next.
    Sometimes—
    I don’t know
    where it’ll take me.

    Shuffle’s got a mind of its own—

    and it’s like it knows
    what I need to hear,
    right when I need
    to hear it.

    It’s like—
    shuffle sees me,
    then shuffle reads me—

    oh, you want to get introspective?
    Here is a song—
    that’ll make you want to look inside.

    Oh, you need to get aggressive?
    Here is a song—
    that’ll make you want to go riot,
    take the pen and get violent.

    It’s like you need to cry,
    and take a walk down memory lane?
    Here is a song,
    and it’s fuel for that pain.

    I like to ride the soundwaves,
    I don’t fight it, I let the music hit—
    I can feel my whole persona shift
    with a change in beat.
    It’s like the music is
    a fast acting chrysalis—
    you see, the music wraps around me
    and I begin to change.
    It’s nothing strange—

    it’s just the way music affects me.

    It enters the bloodstream,
    my DNA rearranges—
    something fundamental changes.
    Not just the surface,
    but marrow deep.

    So I let shuffle steer—
    it knows the roads
    I don’t admit to.
    It makes me go
    where I’m meant to,
    even when I don’t see the map.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [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.

    [Sound as a Vessel]
    “Sound as a Vessel” is a free verse poem about music as emotional architecture, exploring how international artists and soundscapes shaped identity, creativity, memory, and poetic voice.

    [The Music Holds Me Upright]
    A reflective free verse poem about using music, writing, and rhythm to navigate anxiety, depression, and emotional overwhelm.

    [Global Takeover]
    What if home isn’t a place—but something you build from the music you love? Global Takeover blends sound, culture, and identity into one borderless space.

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

  • The Inkbender | A Nerdy Poetry Tribute to Avatar: The Last Airbender

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem began with one simple idea:

    What if bending wasn’t limited to the elements?

    I’ve always loved Avatar: The Last Airbender, not just because of the worldbuilding, but because every bending style reflects a philosophy. Earth is patience. Fire is will. Water is adaptability. Air is freedom.

    As I kept writing, I realized the poem wasn’t really about the characters.

    It was about poetry.

    What if writing could be its own form of bending?

    A poet bends language.

    A storyteller bends memory.

    A confessional writer bends pain into meaning.

    So the references gradually became metaphors for different ways I approach writing: anger becoming fire, healing becoming water, stubborn persistence becoming earth, and the rhythm of language becoming its own kind of element.

    The “nerd note” stays because that’s genuinely how my brain works. I noticed the line wasn’t technically accurate, paused to explain why I changed it, then immediately jumped back into the poem. I could have removed it—but it made me laugh, and sometimes leaving the fingerprints on a poem makes it feel more alive.

    This piece also continues a theme I’ve been exploring lately: treating writing as something almost supernatural. Sometimes I’m a witness. Sometimes I’m a monster in the margins.

    This time…

    I’m an Inkbender.

    — Rowan Evans

    A fantasy-inspired illustration of a poet surrounded by magical ink transforming into earth, fire, water, and air.
    Some people bend the elements. I bend the page.

    The Inkbender
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Tick-Tock—
    I listen to the sound of the clock.
    Eyes open to the world, I watch—
    like I carry time on my wrist.
    I slipped, keys in the lock—
    I dipped—
    ballroom dancing with a twist.
    A list of names—I check twice,
    like my name is Clause—
    kickin’ it with Rudolph.

    Shhh—
    I move earth
    like I’m from Ba Sing Se.
    Now, you must be
    from the southern temples,
    because when you speak—
    all I feel is hot air.

    You’re an airbender,
    if you weren’t aware.

    (Quick nerd note—
    it’s the Southern Air Temple,
    but I had to make it simple—
    so it could hold the rhythm
    and carry the cadence.
    With that explanation
    we can return to
    our regularly scheduled chaos.)

    I bend bars, the way Toph taught me—
    feet planted and never backing down.
    I’m never losing ground—
    I feel out the imperfections,
    bend them to my will.
    I am the originator, that is my skill.

    It starts with a spark,
    a sun with a heart—
    I’m the fire inside, the fire in the sky.
    Call me Fire Lord Ozai
    ’cause I bend
    fire with a pen.
    Leaving destruction across the page
    as I translate my rage—
    the very thing
    that could have become
    my cage.

    Then my motion smooths,
    ink becomes more precise.
    Pen moves like the tide,
    watch me flow and glide—
    my ink like water heals,
    and my mind knows
    how trauma feels.

    If you thought the nomads
    were just gonna get
    a simple diss…

    D’Aang—
    Aang,

    your people mastered letting go,
    I mastered holding on—
    you chase balance,
    I chase bars.

    You run from problems,
    I run through them—
    glider in the sky,
    I’m the storm beneath it.

    Go Avatar State if you want—
    I bend elements with ink,
    you bend them with angst.

    You know, I shouldn’t
    roast the monks too hard.
    Because Ozai did it first
    and I won’t copy that,
    but you walked into this—
    glider first,
    logic last.

    Looking to the future,
    stuck in the past.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [The Life of a Witness Poet]
    What does it mean to love someone when the greatest act of care is simply witnessing their life? This poem explores quiet devotion, distance, and the compassionate heart of a witness poet.

    [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.

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

  • I’d Rather Try | A Poem About Love, Consistency, and Showing Up

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some promises sound beautiful because they are dramatic.

    “I’d die for you.”

    It’s a phrase we’ve heard in songs, films, books, and poetry for centuries. It carries an undeniable emotional weight.

    But while writing this poem, I found myself asking a different question.

    What happens after the dramatic declaration?

    Because most relationships aren’t built on one extraordinary moment.

    They’re built on ordinary ones.

    Showing up.

    Listening.

    Being consistent.

    Choosing someone again tomorrow after choosing them today.

    Dying for someone is an idea that exists in a single moment.

    Living for someone is a practice that unfolds across thousands of moments.

    That’s what this poem is really about.

    Not grand gestures, but quiet commitment.

    Not sacrifice for a day…

    but presence for a lifetime.

    — Rowan Evans

    Two people reaching toward one another across a narrow gap at sunrise, symbolizing trust, consistency, and choosing to show up for someone every day.
    “Love isn’t measured by one extraordinary promise—it is measured by the ordinary moments when we choose to stay, to try, and to be there.”

    I’d Rather Try
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Oh, they said they’d die for you—
    and give all of their life too.
    But would they be there for you
    and truly care too?

    Anyone can say they’d die—
    but would they have the spine,
    when it comes time
    to put it on the line?

    What would I do?

    Well—
    I would try for you
    and live all of my life too.
    I would be there for you,
    and truly care too.

    Yeah, I know—
    anyone can say they’d try,
    but consistency is where
    promises live or die.

    And I’ve tried to prove
    myself consistently.

    To show that I mean
    what I say—
    in more than just words,
    because it’s about the actions too.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Pointing Me Home]
    The final poem in the No Metaphor Left Behind trilogy explores dreams, hope, and belonging. Through moonlight, ocean tides, and quiet conversation, Pointing Me Home reflects on carrying hope long before reaching the place you call home.

    [Only Waiting]
    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.

    [Crossing the Sea]
    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.

    [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]

  • Victor Frankenstein of Rhythm and Rhyme | A Poem About Identity Through Writing

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some poems arrive as observations.

    Others arrive as questions.

    This one began with a question I wasn’t entirely prepared to answer:

    Who am I without writing?

    I’ve spent more than two decades translating my inner world into poetry. Over time, writing stopped feeling like something I do and started feeling like the place where I exist most completely.

    That’s a strange realization.

    Because poetry isn’t simply expression for me—it’s construction.

    Every poem is assembled from fragments: memories, emotions, images, conversations, dreams, fears, humor, hope. I rarely invent from nothing. I gather pieces of lived experience and stitch them together until they begin breathing on their own.

    That’s where the title comes from.

    Victor Frankenstein wasn’t remembered because he created life.

    He was remembered because he assembled it.

    That’s often what writing feels like to me.

    I gather disconnected thoughts, broken emotions, recurring symbols, and scattered moments, then bind them together until they become something capable of standing on its own.

    The result isn’t always comfortable.

    Sometimes it’s beautiful.

    Sometimes it’s monstrous.

    Most often…

    it’s simply honest.

    — Rowan Evans

    A poet writing by candlelight as handwritten pages transform into stitched-together figures made from words, symbolizing creativity, identity, and the act of creating poetry.
    “Every poem begins as fragments—thoughts, memories, emotions, and images—stitched together until they learn how to breathe.”

    Victor Frankenstein of Rhythm and Rhyme
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I’ll be honest—
    I don’t know who I am
    without this,
    without the ink to bleed—

    what does my life even mean?

    I know it means something—
    but I’ve lost sight of it.

    Because I’m like a god here—
    I control the shape
    the ink takes
    and decide what it makes.

    I create every piece
    in my image.

    I write universes into existence—
    populate them with ghosts,
    lovers, gods and monsters.

    And every version of myself
    I couldn’t survive as alone.

    I translate my mental health
    from the inside, no distance.

    I take my mind
    translate it into lines
    and images—
    stitch them together
    as metaphors—

    Victor Frankenstein
    of rhythm, rhyme and imagery.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Pointing Me Home]
    The final poem in the No Metaphor Left Behind trilogy explores dreams, hope, and belonging. Through moonlight, ocean tides, and quiet conversation, Pointing Me Home reflects on carrying hope long before reaching the place you call home.

    [Caller ID: Destiny]
    Sometimes the places we visit in our dreams feel more like home than the places we wake up in. Caller ID: Destiny explores longing, belonging, and the quiet feeling that life is calling you toward somewhere new.

    [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.

    [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.

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

  • Tots, Rocks and All | A Free Verse Poem About Creativity, Humor & Quiet Longing

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Some poems begin with an idea.

    This one began with a phrase that made me laugh.

    “Pockets full of tater tots and rocks.”

    I couldn’t tell you where it came from. My brain simply handed it to me, and I knew I had to follow it.

    That’s how a lot of my writing happens.

    One strange image appears, and instead of questioning it, I trust it. I let the poem figure out why that image belongs there.

    This piece moves the way my thoughts move—quickly, unpredictably, jumping from humor to comic books, from creative confidence to quiet vulnerability without asking permission.

    For a while, it feels like controlled chaos.

    Then, almost without warning, it settles.

    Because beneath the jokes, beneath the references, beneath the absurd image of someone carrying tater tots and rocks around in their pockets, there’s a simple truth waiting to be spoken.

    I spend a lot of time thinking.

    A lot of time creating.

    A lot of time turning emotions into language.

    And underneath all of that, like it is underneath so many of my poems, is the same quiet hope:

    To find someone willing to hold my heart with the same care I try to give theirs.

    Sometimes that’s all a poem is.

    A strange road leading to an honest sentence.

    — Rowan Evans

    A solitary poet stands beside the ocean at sunset with pockets full of rocks and tater tots while handwritten pages become ink in the wind.
    “Sometimes the strangest thoughts lead to the most honest truths.” 🥔🪨✍️🌊

    Tots, Rocks and All
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I’m lost in my thoughts again,
    pockets full of tater tots
    and rocks again.

    Take a dip in the ocean—
    emotion overflowin’
    like the ink from my pen.

    Runaway mind,
    runaway lines.

    This much creativity
    should be a crime.

    I’ll break lines
    the way Bane
    breaks spines.

    And when I get like this
    I like to speak my mind,
    but I don’t speak in vocals—
    I speak in ink and rhyme.

    Now, let’s get real for a minute,
    just a moment of your—

    hands on the clock hold time,
    and I’m looking for a love
    that’ll hold mine.

    I guess that’s the truth of this—
    tots, rocks and all.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [Chemical X]
    Chemical X explores the rapid, associative way one creative mind moves—from cartoons to sports, comic books to music—revealing that inspiration isn’t linear, but a collision of memory, humor, rhythm, and intuition.

    [Pointing Me Home]
    The final poem in the No Metaphor Left Behind trilogy explores dreams, hope, and belonging. Through moonlight, ocean tides, and quiet conversation, Pointing Me Home reflects on carrying hope long before reaching the place you call home.

    [Caller ID: Destiny]
    Sometimes the places we visit in our dreams feel more like home than the places we wake up in. Caller ID: Destiny explores longing, belonging, and the quiet feeling that life is calling you toward somewhere new.

    [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.

    [Memories From a Life Yet to Come]
    Some dreams feel less like fantasy and more like memory. “Memories From a Life Yet to Come” is a reflective free verse poem about longing, displacement, emotional alignment, and the strange comfort of recognizing yourself more clearly in dreams than in waking life.

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

    [Bonus Track]

    I’ve got tater tots in my pockets,
    buried inside with two tickets
    to the Houston Rockets.
    They’re underneath all the rocks,
    it’s kind of insane.

    But I’m trying to sell ’em,
    ’cause I don’t watch sports—
    I watch narratives
    and stories unfold.

    I like the underdog—
    when their story gets told.