I need to stop falling in love over the internet. Today was the first day in a long time that I took a deep breath. This, after ten carcinogenic cathartic cigarettes. I hate myself for the lesson I had to learn. My head just buzzed and I could barely EDIT two pages, let alone write a single word. Shit happens. The only person I’m trying to hold to a higher standard than yesterday is myself. Everyone else is unfair. I apparently have unrealistic expectations of things. Myself included. The lesson, I will never smoke another cigarette. It is now in the same category as all the bad drugs. I thought it’d help, but nope. FLAT NO. I’m glad because I can enjoy certain songs, like San Francisco by Foxygen without romanticizing the idea that I’ll listen to it with a nicotine buzz. I can enjoy life without thinking it’d be better with a smoke. Everything is a little more fresh smelling and present. To take from my favorite straight-edge punk rocker, Henry Rollins,” Loneliness adds beauty to life. It puts a special burn on sunsets and makes night air smell better.” Now, as lonely as I am, that is not the problem I’m grappling with. I think Loneliness could be substituted by Sobriety. For me at least. I thought it was going to be a long trudge through hell, but frankly, I am doing things I would have never expected possible, failures and all. I could bitch all day about how awful it is to be born in this age when there are such extraordinary people alive doing such amazing things. The fact is, I can argue that I am educated enough to understand that people have always been incredible. I ain’t nothing new. Maybe I’m self-centered, but I’d happily trade lives with a lot of other people. Deep down, my thoughts, my second-rate life is better than it has ever been. I wouldn’t trade that. If I can be patient with myself, I think other people will be patient with me. I deserve it. Major other strides were made today. I am finally coming around to accept that I have been in love with an idea of someone rather than the real thing. It is more common than people might think. I think everybody is in love with (or hate) the idea of someone before they get to know them. Before (2 1/2 years ago, when I last tried to “move on”), my argument was that I should just value what I have instead of going looking for something I don’t. Ya know, the grass is always greener is idiotic. But now, I just want to let go of all that crap I’m holding myself accountable to. I can write about the idea of someone, without falling prey to being pathetic. I’ll never be in a healthy relationship if I’m constantly obsessing over the past. You think I’d learn from one of my top 5 favorite books of all time, The Great Gatsby. I think the moral of this little post is that I should be open to change and open my mind. However, any girl who hates on my boy Fitzgerald is gonna run into some serious problems. 😉 I love a lot of authors who’ve killed themselves. It is a fear of mine, for more than one reason, even now, but I don’t think planning out my suicide is going to solve any issues. I just think sometimes I think or write so fast I forget my argument, especially one I’ve been pontificating for so long. so long.
Poet Without a Pen
Ben Bonkoske
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Monday Night Poetry #13
My 600 pound life
is comfortable
step off.
If I want to ride the big wheel in the grocery store
I damn will.
The Mcdonalds down the road is hiring
because I got fired for eating all the customer’s orders
Mchealthly
-B.B
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van
I can’t stop thinking about. For as agonizing as this attention to detail to my past life is, it makes me smile stupidly. I’m pissed, defeated, and unbridledly dancing alone. My horoscope suggests that I try not to draw a straight line from here to the future. I can’t account for two days ago, so why should I try to predict tomorrow. There is enough to worry about today. For once in my life, I am so happily passionate and driven. 9 out of every 10 hours I spend focused on my work as a dysfunctional artist. I don’t need to be judged for not meeting all the expectations of the world, worrying about why what I do is all wrong, because for once, I feel like what I’m doing is right. Still, I feel a lot lately. A muse. I hope nobody thinks that I intend to live the rest of my life under daddy’s roof. “Talk to me when that happens.” I am, if I’m being honest, in limbo, waiting in vain to hear about MFA programs for creative writing. Only one is in Chicago…and as of late, I have the idea that I want to live in Paris for a few years. Granted, Columbia is the only one I am confident I will be admitted to. Jeez, you should have seen the short story I wrote for my application. It is putrid. I sent everyone it because I thought I should showcase my versatility, and convey I could write more than just first person. MY FIRST third-person story was sent to EVERYONE. God, am I ashamed. It was about a man who was in love with a girl he meets in a reoccurring dream. Good concept, poorly written. I’ll post it if I feel up for it (I also revised Bae and rewrote Bae in Paris, and started working on Bae 3). All on my website Poetwithoutapen.com The reason I’m writing Bae 3 now is because I intend to have a collection of short stories published by year’s end, along with a book of poetry, a memoir, a children’s book, and a novella about my great-grandfather…SET YOUR EXPECTATIONS HIGH!!! I can only fail so much. Then I will begin writing the first book that will be published (or the third in the Jack Wright series where he goes to South America on a motorcycle). It is all practice. Maybe I sell myself short. I promise, once all that is done, if I’m alive, I’ll promise to call. That is the honest truth. I have unfinished business. I opened a can of worms that I intend to close. My second novel Carolina, Colorado, California will be published in April. I’m doing a second edition of Spoon in the Road because I’m also ashamed that I published that dog poop. The thing with that story is it reanimated a lot of dead feelings and brought them back to the surface. I don’t want to spoil, or change the ending, but in real life, I made a decision to be with someone…But by writing about all that jazz made me confuse myself with who I was writing about. A character. Archetypes. I thought I couldn’t escape it! Still, one of my greatest regrets was not living in that dirty city I walked to all because of a girl – my hometown sweetheart. Nothing has changed.
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vulgar
It is time that I hop back on the saddle. I have been undergoing GREAT changes over the past 20 days which have interfered with my voracious writing. Well, at least my public writing. Back to business! I am an old fart. Personally, I don’t think I am smarter than the average joe, but my ability to keep on consistently trying, failure after failure makes me feel somewhat accomplished. I don’t live for others, though. I used to. In fact, I had a thousand word rebuttal to try and convince a lil’ lady to fall back in love with me that I either didn’t have the heart to share, edit, and confess, or quite frankly the time. But Believe me when I say she would have been swooning at the moon! I just don’t think it is fair to go on writing love letters to the world. Last I remember, romance is a rather private ordeal. Unless you are referring to weddings, which are a very public obligation. I think it is natural, when you have nobody in your life, to think about that special lil’ someone in that special lil’ way. What wonderful, messy years! But now I am an old fart that I don’t want anyone else smelling. I have learned to enjoy the smell of my own farts. I have also become very disdainful towards all of my luxuries. All the things that I wished I had a year ago, I want to cut off someone’s head now having known what I ignorantly was waiting for. God, if that isn’t a little life lesson I should learn early. I am waiting for superwoman, and I doubt she will be good company. I think my generation is far too picky. I had a good deal going on. We hated each other but at least we were happy.
I saw three little twinkling stars in a row, much like the three little dreams I wish for every night, and there they hung in the sky, like an ornament on the Universe’s Christmas tree.
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.
Ben Bonkoske 