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

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]