Ben Bonkoske

Poet Without a Pen

Ben Bonkoske

  • sorry (sorry)

    As per usual, I am listening to the saddest music on the planet. I don’t – God, how I start so many sentences with a negative (and I also think that use of an em dash is one of the few correct usages of the punctuation; It is usually a break in a sentence or thought, not necessarily a continuation of a previous point as it is commonly used in modern writing). Hmmm. I don’t…I don’t remember what I was going to say: I don’t want to act like my pain is any more important than anyone else, and I don’t want to validate it any more than it needs to be reasonably acknowledged. If your arm was broken, you might want to mention it to someone.

    I guess I just have come to rely on writing. I knew I needed to write tonight, not because I wanted to, but because, like Bukowski, things really start getting screwy pretty fast if I don’t do it. I journal, so it doesn’t have to be a public affair if it doesn’t have to be. But, I have come to rely on these blog posts as a way to share with the world whatever I happen to find wrong with myself that I don’t want to carry alone. Whether it goes into the ether and evaporates right out of my soul, or hundreds of people now know, it really doesn’t matter to me. I don’t think of writing as an addiction. I also don’t look at the belief that I have come to depend on 12-step meetings as a weakness. I think there are a lot of things I am trying to figure out, not because I want to, but because a lot of things have gone pretty screwy for me.

    I’ve been writing on Substack, and for those of you reading this on Substack, I am also posting this on my website BenBonPoetry.com. I have never really introduced myself on Substack. I am planning on writing an introduction letter for Substack, which will also appear on my own website. However, the moral of tonight’s letter is that you don’t know a person just because you read their blog posts, or went to high school with them. I don’t think I knew who I was when I was 18; A lot of people don’t know who they are at that age. I’m 27 years old, so I have a basic idea of what my personality is like, but that doesn’t mean I know who I am.

    You sit there on the bus for the thousandth time since you’ve moved back and recite a Good Will Hunting Scene for the hundredth time, and you cry, because even though you might not have been a genius, it still wasn’t your fault. I’ve been telling myself for a long time that ‘I don’t blame that kid” anymore; It wasn’t his fault for all he had to go through. But he was told it was his fault for who he was, by someone who was told it was his fault for who he was. So who do you blame, Grandpa?

    I think the worst thing about when you are trying to get to know someone, and by that nature, trying to unknow yourself, is that you are far too attached to the things you hate about yourself, what happened and why, more than you could ever allow yourself to get attached to someone else, and you blame them for that sort of thing.

  • The Boncast #1 – Patrick Baranovskis

  • Typewriter Tuesday 1.7.25

  • Monday Night Poetry 1.6.25

  • cool, I just set up all the audio

    It has felt like so long since I have written just a tried and true blog post.

    Last night I spent the night at my mentor’s apartment. His son is struggling with being bullied at the same high school I attended. I feel bad because it has probably been at least a month since I have been over and seen the kid.

    He says he understands, but I know it hurts when people pass you by.

    However, God’s honest truth is that I have been having a very hectic holiday season, which ends tomorrow with the anniversary of my mother’s death; it wouldn’t be the holidays without death around the corner.

    And then I have until February before everything gets back into the swing of things because there are a few birthdays, my own included, that creep up around that time.

    However, here is the story: My Thanksgiving was very draining. I was with my mother’s family, and being that we are not always the most balanced people, there was a little turbulence.

    A very common occurrence at any Holiday gathering – A Political Disagreement.

    It took a lot out of me.

    I don’t think that I had some overly idealistic expectations that were squandered because my family didn’t show up in the way I wanted them to. I think it was more so that I put myself in the middle and tried to carry the weight of the family on my shoulders and it was heavier than I expected.

    And then I wrote a 20,000-page essay about it and chain-smoked for a week.

    Let it be known that whatever is online titled “Our Fucked up Families” right now is a first draft. I will probably finish it in about ten years.

    But the emotional strife of holidays gone wrong, and some reactive behavior has made life “hectic.” I don’t think that life has really been any crazier than it usually is (which is pretty crazy), it is just that my mental and emotional faculties have been kinda compromised.

    However, I know just what to do!

    I have a good schedule and routine, and I’ve been able to get back to sane hours and follow my general schedule of things.

    And the reason one follows a schedule is so that one can divert from it.

    So the good news is Christmas with my dad’s family was great – except for one oversight – which was that I forgot all of the gifts I bought my family at my grandmas… Aside from that, it was great. I got all sorts of goodies. Including a microphone, and I just recorded my first podcast. So Hallelujah.

    The Boncast Episode #1 should be up in a week or so. I’d bet you can guess who my first guest is if you know me.

    And I also published my fourth book, Eleven Stories for 11:11 on the 23rd. That was a crazy night too.

    But tomorrow I am cleaning my apartment, going to a meeting, and going to bed.

    Saturday I am going to a meeting, going mattress shopping, Zoo lights, and going to bed.

    Sunday I am doing Thai Chi, Visiting Grandma, going to a meeting and going to bed.

    And on Monday, I go to my job, and it all starts all over again.

Ben Bonkoske is the author of two novels, Spoon in the Road, and Carolina, Colorado, California. He is also the author of two collections of short stories, Ten Zen by Ben, and Eleven Stories for 11:11. He lives in Chicago, where he likes to take walks.

B. A, M.A.T.