trauma-informed art – Poetry by Rowan Evans

Where the Bones Refuse to Break

Rowan Evans

I balance on the splintered edge of dusk,
where the horizon blinks like a dying pulse,
and every breath feels borrowed
from a ghost I used to be.

There is no scream left in my marrow,
only the hum of static silence—
a lullaby for the hollowed,
a prayer without a god.

Pain is a second spine
threaded through my ribs like piano wire.
I don’t flinch when it sings anymore,
I’ve grown fond of its chorus.

But you—
you are the whisper between my fractures,
the only warmth in this cathedral of frost,
the lone candle still brave enough to burn.

When you’re near,
the ash learns to dream again.
I carry the weight not because I must,
but because you are worth the breaking.

Yet when I’m alone,
I decay in soft installments,
shedding pieces of self like dead petals—
graceful, unnoticed,
until nothing remains but a name echoing in smoke.

Don’t leave me
to collapse in my own absence.
Stay—be the tether that keeps me flesh.
I fear I’ll become mist if you turn away.

But I see your heaviness too,
your shoulders bowed like twilight trees
bracing for one more storm.
So let me be your scaffold,
your sanctum of sighs.
Let me soften the hurt in your blood
the way you alchemized mine into light.

I will pour every last drop of myself
into the cracks that threaten you,
until neither of us has to stand alone
on the trembling precipice again.

Together,
we’ll make a home
from all the pieces that refused to shatter.

Jun 9, 2025 8:03 PM

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Of Ashes & Reverence: A Love Letter to the Broken, the Bold, and the Becoming

Rowan Evans

Of Ashes & Reverence
A Dark Romance Novella

Lilith has mastered survival. Her world is built from ashes—walls forged in betrayal, silence, and scars that still whisper. To her, love has always meant vulnerability. And vulnerability has always meant pain.

Gabriel sees past the armor. He’s patient, steady, and everything she’s never dared believe in. Their connection is undeniable—burning hot, terrifyingly tender. But for Lilith, every touch is a test. Every kind word, a crack in her foundation.

As passion ignites and buried wounds resurface, both must confront the ghosts they carry. For Lilith, it means risking more than just her body—it means surrendering control, and trusting her heart.
For Gabriel, it means holding on… without holding too tight.

A tale of trauma and tenderness, power and vulnerability, Of Ashes & Reverence is a darkly intimate journey through pain, healing, and the radical, luminous act of being truly seen.

—

Author’s Note:
Welcome to Neo-Gothic Confessional Romanticism

—

This is more than a love story. It is a confession wrapped in shadows, a resurrection of softness from the ashes of pain.

Neo-Gothic Confessional Romanticism is a genre I created to hold space for the parts of us that ache and burn and bloom all at once. It is where gothic atmosphere meets emotional vulnerability, where romance is both sanctuary and storm. These stories are written with open wounds and hopeful hearts, where love doesn’t fix the broken—but chooses to stay anyway.

Here, you’ll find characters who carry trauma like sacred relics, who speak with trembling honesty, who ache for connection even as they fear it. The intimacy is raw, sometimes rough, but always reverent. These are tales of worship and reckoning, of shadows and survival. Of becoming known.

Of Ashes & Reverence is my first full offering in this genre. It is a story born of my own confessions, fears, and longings—an altar built from grief and devotion.

If you see yourself here—if you’ve ever felt too much, wanted too deeply, or survived too quietly—then this story is for you.

With tenderness and truth,
Rowan Evans

More Coming Soon…

Jun 5, 2025 4:48 PM

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Poetry by Rowan Evans

Tag: trauma-informed art

Where the Bones Refuse to Break

Of Ashes & Reverence: A Love Letter to the Broken, the Bold, and the Becoming