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Poetry by Rowan Evans

Tag: self-discovery

  • Before My Feet Touch the Floor | A Poem About Dreams, Memory & Identity

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    I’ve written about dreams for years.

    Not because I think they predict the future. Not because I think they’re magical.

    Because they feel real.

    Real enough that sometimes waking up feels stranger than the dream itself.

    I don’t think people talk enough about that moment between sleeping and waking—the brief period where both realities still exist at the same time.

    The dream is fading.

    The room is returning.

    And for a few seconds, you’re caught between them.

    That’s where this poem lives.

    I’ve had dreams that felt so vivid, so emotionally complete, that waking up felt like losing something. Not a person. Not a place. A version of myself.

    A self that existed somewhere else.

    The older I get, the more fascinated I become by that feeling.

    Why do some dreams linger for hours while entire days disappear from memory?

    Why do imaginary places sometimes feel more familiar than real ones?

    Why does waking occasionally feel like arriving somewhere instead of returning?

    This piece doesn’t try to answer those questions.

    It simply sits with them.

    Because there are mornings when the first thing I feel isn’t relief that the dream is over.

    It’s grief that it ended.

    And I suspect I’m not the only one.

    — Rowan Evans

    A woman sits on the edge of her bed between waking and dreaming as a surreal dream-world fades around her.
    Some mornings feel less like waking up and more like saying goodbye to a life that only existed while you were asleep.

    Before My Feet Touch the Floor
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Dreams—
    a common topic
    in my poetry.

    It’s because
    they don’t feel fake to me.
    They feel like memories.

    Do know what it’s like
    to wake up confused—
    because you’re in your own room?

    How do you live—
    when your dreams are more alive
    than your waking life?

    It’s as if the person I was
    a moment ago
    is still out there,
    waiting for me
    to return.

    So I lie there,
    trying to remember
    which version of me
    is the imposter—
    the one who wakes,
    or the one who wanders.

    Sometimes I think
    the dream‑me
    is the one who remembers,
    and I’m the one
    who forgets.

    Because if I feel more alive
    in the places I can’t stay,
    what does that make
    the life I return to?

    There’s a mourning
    no one talks about—
    the kind that happens
    before your feet
    touch the floor.

    Journey into the Hexverse…

    [The Streets I Walk When I Sleep]
    “The Streets I Walk When I Sleep” is a deeply intimate free verse poem about recurring dreams, emotional connection, longing across distance, and the strange feeling of remembering places and moments that have never happened in waking life.

    [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]

  • 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 Wrong Side of the Globe – A Poem About Feeling Out of Place and Not Belonging

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    There’s a kind of disconnection that goes beyond mood or circumstance.

    It’s not just about having a bad day, or feeling out of place for a moment. It’s deeper than that—like something fundamental doesn’t line up. Like the life you’re living doesn’t match the shape of who you are.

    For a long time, I tried to understand that feeling as something internal. Something to fix, adjust, or push through.

    But this piece comes from questioning that.

    From considering that maybe the discomfort isn’t a flaw—
    maybe it’s misalignment.

    Maybe it’s the result of existing in a space that doesn’t reflect you, doesn’t hear you, doesn’t hold the parts of you that matter.

    And maybe the answer isn’t to force yourself to fit—
    but to find where you already do.

    — Rowan Evans

    Person sitting alone at the edge of a bed at dawn symbolizing feeling out of place and disconnected.
    Sometimes it’s not that you’re lost—it’s that you woke up in a life that was never meant for you.

    The Wrong Side of the Globe
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I wake up—
    not just on
    the wrong side
    of the bed.

    I wake up
    on the wrong
    side of the globe—

    in a life
    that doesn’t fit
    the shape of me

    I wake up
    in a timezone
    my body refuses,
    in a climate
    my skin protests,
    in a country
    my soul didn’t choose.

    I wake up
    as the wrong version
    of myself,
    a silhouette
    in someone else’s dawn,
    a life misaligned
    with its own pulse—

    speaking a language
    this place won’t hear,
    carrying histories
    this soil won’t hold,
    belonging to a map
    not on the wall.

    I wake up…

    in a morning
    meant for someone else.

    In a season
    I wasn’t built for.

    In a story
    I don’t remember choosing.

    I wake up
    already tired
    from carrying a life
    that was never mine…

    I wake up
    wanting a world
    that fits my outline—

    a morning
    that knows my name.

    So I drift off—
    falling into sleep,
    praying that I…

    wake up
    to a place
    that feels like mine,

    a life
    that finally fits—

    the shape of me.

    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.

    [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.

    [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]

  • 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]

  • Beneath the Surface | A Poem About Deep Connection and Vulnerability

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece comes from a place of wanting more than surface-level connection.

    It’s easy to exist in spaces where we show only what’s safe–what’s presentable, what won’t be questioned too deeply. But I’ve always been drawn to what lives underneath that. The quiet parts. The complicated parts. The things people carry but don’t always speak out loud.

    This poem isn’t just about seeing someone–it’s about being trusted with what’s beneath the surface. The scars, the thoughts, the moments that shaped them in ways the world doesn’t always get to witness.

    There’s a kind of intimacy in that. Not in fixing or changing someone, but in understanding them. In holding space for everything they are, even the parts that feel hidden or unfinished.

    At its core, this piece is about connection–not the easy kind, but the kind that asks you to slow down, to listen, and to see someone fully.

    And maybe, to be seen the same way.

    — Rowan Evans

    Person standing at the edge of water with a glowing emotional world beneath the surface representing vulnerability and depth
    The surface is safe—but the truth lives beneath it.

    Beneath the Surface
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    Why are so many okay with
    settling at the surface?
    I want to dig deeper—
    get to the core of you.

    See where the roots lie,
    the ties that bind—
    let me see the universe
    behind your eyes.

    Windows to a galaxy
    all your own
    and I want to call,
    at least one of those worlds—
    my home.

    Let me go beyond
    what the eyes can see,
    let me peer within,
    let your soul breathe.

    Take a breath,
    relax.

    I just want to know—
    I want to see the essence,
    the truth,
    And all of the scars
    you don’t disclose.

    I want to hear the stories
    of the battles fought,
    the wars waged
    in silent thought.

    The ones
    nobody else knew—
    I want to help mend
    the fractures in you.

    The surface is safe,
    but I want the depths,
    the places
    where your heart has wept.
    I want to touch
    the parts untouched by light—
    where dreams
    and fears take flight.

    Let me see the storm
    inside your soul,
    the cracks,
    the pieces,
    the parts—
    that don’t feel whole.

    Because—
    I want to understand.

    Not just the surface,
    but every grain of sand.
    Every emotion, every tear—
    All of the things
    that make you real,
    that make you—

    You.

    Not the mask,
    not the show,
    But the truth
    you often don’t show.
    I want to see—
    to feel,
    and to know.

    The beautiful chaos
    that makes you whole.

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

  • Standing Between Us | Identity & Love Poem

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece lives in a space between two interpretations, and I wrote it that way on purpose.

    It can be read as a reflection on identity–on the versions of ourselves we carry, the ones we’ve been, and ones we hesitate to become. A room filled with selves, each one shaped by different choices, different fears, different moments of almost.

    But it can also be read as something more relational. The figure in the piece–“her”–can exist as a person. Someone who feels steady, certain, present in a way the speaker isn’t yet. Someone who becomes a point of gravity.

    What matters to me is that the distance between them comes from the same place in both readings.

    Not circumstance.

    Not timing.

    But hesitation.

    In that way, the poem sits in the overlap between becoming and connection–where reaching someone else and becoming yourself start to feel like the same act.

    — Rowan Evans

    Multiple versions of a person standing in a dim surreal room with a distant glowing figure symbolizing identity and connection
    A room full of who I was, who I am, and who I haven’t learned to be yet.

    Standing Between Us
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I walk into a room
    that knows my name too well.

    It is filled with me—
    not reflections,
    not mirrors—
    but selves.

    They stand where I once stood,
    breathe how I used to breathe,
    hold their hands like I remember doing
    before I knew why.

    Some look at me.
    Most don’t.

    They are not ghosts—
    not quite.
    I cannot see through them.
    They have weight.
    Presence.
    Like memories
    that never learned how to fade.

    I move through them anyway.

    Shoulder brushing shoulder—
    past brushing present—
    future turning its head
    just a second too late.

    And then—

    her.

    Not fully seen.
    Never fully seen.

    A glimpse
    between the space
    of two mistakes,
    I used to make.

    A flicker
    caught in the outline
    of who I used to be
    and who I might become.

    I follow.

    Or maybe I orbit.

    Because every time I get close,
    another version of me steps in the way—
    hesitation given form,
    fear with a body,
    longing wearing my face.

    I want to call out—
    but which voice is mine?

    They all sound like me.

    So I keep moving.

    Through regret.
    Through almosts.
    Through the selves that loved—
    too early,
    too late…

    too quietly.

    And still—
    I see her.

    Soft.
    Certain.
    Waiting in the space
    I haven’t learned to stand in yet.

    I think—

    no.

    I know.

    She is not lost in this room.

    I am.

    And every version of me
    that I refuse to become
    is standing between us.

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

  • Roots & Wings – A Poem About Leaving, Growth, and New Horizons | Rowan Evans

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    Sometimes a place stops feeling like home long before you actually leave it. The streets still know your name, but something in you has already begun drifting toward another horizon.

    This poem came from that feeling – the quiet moment you realize your roots are no longer meant for the soil you’re standing in. It’s not always about running away; sometimes it’s about allowing yourself to grow somewhere new.

    Roots & Wings sits in that space between leaving and becoming. Between the life that shaped you and the one waiting somewhere beyond the horizon.

    We carry out roots with us, even when we learn how to fly.

    — Rowan Evans

    A bird flying toward the sunset above palm trees and the ocean, symbolizing freedom and new beginnings.
    Sometimes growth means planting new roots—and trusting your wings to find the horizon.

    Roots & Wings
    Poetry by Rowan Evans
    (written February 18th, 2025)

    These streets whisper my name, but I no longer listen,
    my roots ache for softer soil, where the sun glistens.
    I’ll plant myself where the palms embrace the sea,
    then let the wind carry what’s left of me—
    a bird unbound, chasing horizons yet unseen.

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

  • Just Visiting – A Poem About Not Feeling at Home

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    I’ve written around this feeling for years — in metaphors, in longing, in coded language about distance and departure.

    This is the first time I’ve said it this plainly.

    For most of my life, I’ve felt like a visitor in the place I was born. Not in a dramatic way. Not in a rebellious way. Just in a quiet, persistent way that never left.

    This piece isn’t about anger. It isn’t about rejection.

    It’s about finally naming what I’ve always known—
    that sometimes “home” is assigned to you,
    and sometimes it’s something you’re still moving toward.

    — Rowan Evans

    A lone traveler standing in an airport terminal at dusk, looking out at distant city lights with a suitcase beside them.
    Sometimes the place you’re born isn’t the place you’re meant to stay.

    Just Visiting
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I’ve been talking about it a lot lately,
    this feeling of wanting to escape
    that I’ve had since I was just a baby.
    I was forced to call this place home,
    because this is where I was born—
    it never felt like home,
    just a place I was visiting.

    Every day in school—
    I’d recite the pledge,
    like a good
    little patriot
    should.
    But I didn’t believe in it,
    there was no allegiance in it.

    They say they’re proud to be an American,
    well me? I’ve never been,
    because this is just a place to me.
    I’ve said it before, once in this poem alone—
    this place has never been my home.

    And I’ve lived all across it.
    Never once have I have felt planted,
    no roots took hold.
    Felt like a tourist—
    in a place I was
    supposed to belong.

    But I’ve known for a while now,
    my place is not within these borders.
    This place will never be
    home for me.
    But it will always be
    a part of me. (Sadly.)

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

  • Toward Somewhere I Can Breathe | A Poem About Longing, Disconnection & Finding Home

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This piece is about a feeling I’ve struggled to name for most of my life — a feeling that I have tried to explain more recently — a quiet but persistent disconnect that began when I was fourteen.

    It isn’t about hating where I’m from.
    It isn’t about romanticizing somewhere else.

    It’s about that internal shift — the moment you realize you feel unrooted in a place where everyone else seems firmly planted.

    For years, I thought I was running away.
    Now I understand I’ve been moving toward something.

    Whether that “home” is a city, a country, a person, or a version of myself I haven’t fully stepped into yet — I don’t know.

    But I know this:
    I am not lost anymore.
    I am in motion.

    — Rowan Evans

    A lone figure looking toward a distant city skyline under a star-filled night sky, symbolizing longing and the search for home.
    Sometimes home isn’t where you started. Sometimes it’s where you finally breathe.

    Toward Somewhere I Can Breathe
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I’ve tried my whole life
    to explain it.
    This disconnect,
    I’ve felt since
    2004.

    How can I make it
    any more clear?
    I just don’t belong here.

    I’m going to try
    and try to make it
    make sense.
    I was fourteen,
    Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi
    on the screen.

    But that’s not the important part.

    Inside—
    I could feel
    threads fray,
    and they
    already existed
    in decay.

    But I learned quickly,
    in 2007 exactly—
    there is Filth in the Beauty,
    and the reverse
    can be the same.

    That’s when
    my view of the
    world changed,
    and became
    cemented.

    Something shifted,
    vision cleared—
    and everything
    I missed before,
    just appeared.

    Where everyone
    around me,
    seemed rooted
    in the here.

    And I—
    would close my eyes,
    and wish upon
    shooting stars.
    I wanted out,
    I wanted to leave,
    go somewhere far.

    I knew it would take time,
    I needed things to align.
    But now I know
    what I’m moving toward,
    what I’m working for.

    I’m moving toward home.
    A place, where I belong.

    Maybe when I finally leave,
    I’ll touch down in the Philippines
    to walk Manila’s streets,
    and finally be able to breathe.

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

  • Since I Was Thirteen (Fluent in Survival) – Rowan Evans Poetry

    Rowan Evans

    Author’s Note

    This poem is not about wanting to die.
    It is about learning how to survive long before learning how to live.

    A shadowed figure in a dimly lit room, reflecting in solitude, surrounded by deep shadows and soft light, evoking introspection and survival.
    Reflecting on survival, solitude, and the quiet strength found in shadows.

    Since I Was Thirteen (Fluent in Survival)
    Poetry by Rowan Evans

    I feel like I’m lost,
    I’m wandering.
    Twisted thoughts,
    I’m pondering.

    My demise
    in a life I despise.
    It’s not that I want to die—
    I’m just tired
    of trying to survive.

    I want to be happy.
    I’m alive.

    But my head
    is so full of dread—
    every morning
    a negotiation
    just to get out of bed.

    Body feels heavy,
    limbs lagging—
    everything moves
    in slow-motion.

    Slipping into shadows—
    going home.
    The light has never felt like mine.
    I was born in the shadows,
    raised in the shade.
    Darkness has been
    my mindscape—
    since I was thirteen.

    I learned early
    how to make myself small—
    how to soften my footsteps
    inside my own head.

    I memorized the weight of silence,
    learned which thoughts were safe to keep
    and which ones
    needed to stay buried.

    Survival became a second language,
    spoken fluently,
    even when no one was listening.

    I say I’m alive
    like it’s a defense—
    like survival
    should be enough.

    But living
    feels like something other people do
    without rehearsing it first.

    Closing Note

    I wrote this for anyone who learned survival before they learned safety.
    For those who are still here, even when “alive” feels like a negotiation.
    You are not failing — you are fluent in something the world never taught gently.

    For more poetry, check out the archives: [The Library of Ashes]