First podcast episode has dropped! Check it out HERE!  It features a reading of Covenant the first poem in my poetry collection that was released in February! Grab your copy of Lamentations on Living HERE! Copyright(c) 2026 Rayven Holmes

I'm a quarter of the way through with my first round of edits. Slow and steady. Slow and steady. Slow and steady... Planning to set up the Kickstarter later this weekend. I've been fleshing out the timeline while making edits. I'm excited and absolutely fucking terrified. Here's to doing the damn thing scared! You can find my current poetry book and information on my upcoming novel HERE! Rya ! Copyright(c) 2026 Rayven Holmes

I wrote this in 2015.  It has taken me 11 years to finally post it.  This piece has been updated to include more inclusive language.   This has been six years in the making.  Six years of saying I’m fine and I’ve moved on, when the opposite is true.  A lot can happen in a day.  Whole worlds change, you can experience heart-bursting joy or earth-shattering pain in just one course of 24 hours.  You can even experience both at the same time.  Oh, to experience both.  To cry and

This year, I promised myself I would publish one book, a book of poetry to be exact. It's comprised of poems spanning the last decade and some change of my life. I wanted a small win to keep me chugging along on the novel whose first draft is like 98 - 99% done.   After fighting with formatting, and wondering if I've lost my mind more times than I can count, I clicked order on the proof. It won't land in my hands first. The blessing and curse of traveling is that I have to pa

This piece began eight months ago.   Four months ago, our family embarked on a cross-country road trip in a big ass pickup truck with a bigger on the inside fifth wheel attached.  As we reach the junction where our journey is to pivot and expand beyond sea to shining sea, my therapist has tasked me with reflecting not just on the past four months but on the past two years as well and what I’ve learned, what has changed, since I pushed the cremation button and decided to rise

Dust to dust...  I wanted to write this months ago, but I think the emotions were still too raw for me to articulate in a manner that was beyond babbling sobs.  I’ve learned a lot of things about ashes, specifically of the human remains variety, over the past couple of years.   I learned on the day my mother was cremated that while there are all sorts of buttons and settings trained professionals use to ensure the machine works as intended, there’s still one master button tha

It’s been two and a half years since my mother died, and I feel as if I’ve lived multiple lifetimes traveling through the dimensions of grief.  Last year, we sold our house, shoved what we valued into a storage unit, and hit the road.  I figured if the country could collectively lose its goddamn mind, then I could finally stop being scared and do the thing I’ve been talking about doing for decades: see the fucking world.   The experience has been at times harrowing, but alway

You knew all the right words, that's what made you so dangerous  A wolf in hipster’s clothes,  mascarading as informed while you kept your hand hidden under the table of white supremacy  Your position at the table always… safe,  as long as you consumed me to patch the holes selling your soul left in your ego  You knew not how to fight for my humanity,  only how to circumnavigate it I was different from the rest, and so were you…   the first wasn't a compliment, the second was

January 1st marks the beginning of a New Year for our calendar, but it is not an actual New Year. The Earth wakes up in the spring, and that is when I acknowledge the new beginnings on an earthly scale.   On a personal scale, my New Year begins in February at my birthday… in the dead of winter, when I partake in the ritual of gathering around fire and making a wish for the possibilities of another spin around the sun. In this quiet, before the Earth returns anew, I shed the s

I got louder, weirder, freer.  I broke the lock on my cage for good.  I peeked my head out and took in a deep breath, and I jumped. 

Greeting the early daylight  To shine light on the places I've forgotten Dawning a horizon of hope to chase away the nightmares

They saved me a seat at the table, but the seat was a test  Could I be controlled  Would I conform  How easily could I be consumed

But time always keeps score

You couldn't change their minds  But you never corrected their vision  Whitewashing my love with self-hate and projection

My heart makes a lovely piece of art  As the pieces lay lifeless upon our kitchen table  A final meal for the most undeserving of guests 

Processing the impact of being labeled a chore has on a person.

Have a seat on my porch and share in the chaos that is this magical life.

A bit of magick through poetry.

I want to touch the whole of Mother Earth  To feel her under my feet and between my toes To be caressed by her warmth and feel her...

"I see the hollowness behind my eyes as you smile cheek to cheek, each crease in your face paid for with the whispers of my soul ..."