Author’s Note

Writing Has Never Been the Problem
There are things I can say beautifully on a page that I struggle to say out loud.

That’s one of the central contradictions of being a poet: I can take something complicated, painful, frightening, or deeply personal and turn it into lines of poetry—but when the page disappears and I’m standing in front of the person who matters, suddenly the words don’t come so easily.

Writing Has Never Been the Problem (Promises on the Page) is about that gap.

Because writing a promise is easy compared to keeping one.

On the page, I can find the perfect words. I can explain myself. I can make the feeling beautiful. I can build an entire world around what I mean.

But eventually, the poem has to leave the page.

Eventually, words have to become choices.

And that’s where the real question begins:

Can I live what I write?

This poem isn’t me claiming that I’ve figured that out. It’s me admitting that the page is the place where my confidence is strongest—and that becoming the person behind those words is the harder work.

The writing has never been the problem.

Living it is.

— Rowan Evans

Writing Has Never Been the Problem (Promises on the Page)
Poetry by Rowan Evans

I’ve been trying to be more honest lately,
not that I’ve been lying directly—
just by omission, admittedly.
I was keeping things to myself,
things I could have said on the page—
I know I can’t say them to her face,
or even over the phone—
the only place safe is the page,
the place my words call home—
it’s where my voice is the loudest,
where I stand the proudest—
where my confidence is loud,
but doesn’t shout—

I know I’m good at what I do,
but I know I could do better too—
I could be better for her,
I already write the prettiest words—
even the ones absurd,
every single verse—
not a single word rehearsed,
even the ones written—
writing has never been the problem.

It’s always been speaking—
always been living,
that’s the thing I struggle with—
I can make all the promises on the page,
phrased in a hundred different ways—
but can I follow through?
Can I do what I’m supposed to do
when it matters most to her?
Or would I become another problem too?
Another example of what not to settle for,
I’m saying this plain, no need for metaphors.

Journey into the Hexverse

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