The Past, the Present, the Uncharted Heart

by Raimond Klavins

The past few years have been a journey of profound unraveling and reassembly. After leaving a life that eroded my being, I found myself navigating a path between despair and sovereignty. 

This poem is the distillation of that experience—a map of the interior wilderness I traversed to find a new voice and a steady peace. Writing it was an act of reclamation, a way to shape pain into something beautiful and true. 

Sharing these words is the very reason I began this blog: to offer a testament that from the ashes of a cremated past, an uncharted heart can begin to beat.

Book Review: Rejection Letters

 — A Vaccine Against Rejection

Book: Rejection Letters by Edward O’Dwyer
Published: May 2025, Truth Serum Press

Most self-help books teach you how to deal with rejection. Edward O’Dwyer’s hilarious short story collection, Rejection Letters, does something far more powerful: it inoculates you against rejection by reprogramming your emotional response to it. After reading it cover-to-cover a few times, the result wasn’t a new strategy in my mind, but a subliminal shift — a new default in my nervous system. The very concept of rejection began to trigger not dread, but laughter, even in real-life situations.

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Alpha-Seeker, the Scapegoat, and the Silent Chorus

For anyone who’s ever left a gathering feeling small

This poem is a mirror held up to the most common—and most damaging—social power play: the Alpha-Seeker, the Scapegoat, and the Silent Chorus. You’ve felt it: the glance that cuts, the laugh that excludes, the subtle script you’re forced to follow. You’ve been the Scapegoat, shrinking under someone’s sneer. You’ve been the Chorus, trading your voice for peace. This poem maps that ecosystem with devastating clarity. If you’ve ever been any of these three—and most of us have—save it. Keep it close. It’s more than a poem; it’s a diagnostic tool.