Ben Bonkoske

Poet Without a Pen

Ben Bonkoske

  • undone

    It has really been wonderful, but I’m ready to die. Not literally, sorry, trigger averted. I think that might sound ironic to my avid readers since all I write about is how terrible life is, the pains and everything. Good times aren’t worth being written about or captured. I forget anyhow. I just can’t get out of bed in the morning, afternoon, and for some reason, I’d rather binge-watch through the night than dream. I don’t want to dream anymore, therefore, figuratively if you’ll permit, I’m dead inside. I look forward to a good cry that might remind me that the are things beneath the surface. I’d welcome a shallow laugh. Something that kills inside, but comforts the impending seriousness I am consumed with. In the past, I’d have something to lean on. But these days, I’ve been whisked off to sea. What do you do in the middle of the ocean? Swim towards land or just make it easier rather than die from exhaustion. I have so little direction. This is what I’ve got left. This is what makes me want to swim. It makes me float when in reality I am drowning. I’m in a rush for no reason. Nothing or no one is waiting for one more page of chicken scratch. I get sick of my reminders of how awful I am at being reliable to myself. I doubt anyone would want to watch this disaster unfold. Too young to be excused. I think I believe that if I write so much, in my allotted amount of time, a ratio of days to words that is forever increasing, I will become immortal; I will dream forever in young boy’s and girl’s imaginations. Just don’t be surprised when I tell the world I told you so.

    Instagram: Bencbon

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  • Monday Night Poetry #6

    I hope everything is not about me

    I withdraw from life

    woken up when I want to sleep

    but sleep doesn’t make life sweet

    I do, want to be a part of someone’s something

    covered in cat fur and baby puke

    but those things never seem to want me

    so I pretend to see clearly

    like a paraplegic walking away

    Being unimportant reminds me of love

    an irrational reason to break the silence

    with a beating heart’s finale

    -B.B

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  • Understanding

    Oh boy. Boy, oh boy. I feel like a slug. I look like a slug. And I acted like a slug the past two days. I feel like Stephen King after he got sober and forgot how to write. His wife sat with him, word by word, until he gained back the ability to type seven hundred suspenseful pages. My creative output is appalling. I’m falling behind and slowly falling into the category of the ordinary. I am making excuses for why I’m so unsuccessful. I have no right to feel so bad for myself and be so lethargic. I feel like I’m just running on a treadmill. I might break a sweat but I’m not getting anywhere. I have nothing to show and I rely on an old lady who is postponing the release date of my second overdue novel. It makes me want to cry that I will be 24 with only one, poorly punctuated, mistake-ridden, expository, stream of conscious, craphole of a book. Spoon in the Road if you are feeling…masochistic. And why is that when I give myself a break, I end up feeling the most like shit. I don’t want days off. They plague me like chemotherapy. It is probably the roll of Oreos I ate today…and the pizza I ate yesterday. Nobody cares. My life is unexceptional and will be forgotten and discarded into the plethora of oversaturated prose and poetry. The moral of the story is that the party ends. We all have to wake up for work on Monday. I try so damn hard to be the most productive, but the truth is, I was a better functioning person while stoned. I wasn’t a better person. I wasn’t happier. I just wrote more. Not as consistently, but at least it was the things I wanted to write about instead of some half-assed perfunctory blog. I have an article I’m supposed to write that is already old news. Not to mention, I wasted this past year on getting clean. I just feel like my life has been a HUGE waste of time. I’m really no better off than I was a year ago. Technically, I’m worse off. I’m a year older and I have accomplished less with my life. I equate success with how much I’ve done. I do a lot, but none of it counts. And NONE of it seems to make a difference. I haven’t changed worth a damn. It isn’t the number of books I’ve read that I will look back at. It will be a combination of what I wrote, and what I did. I fill up my day with forgetful rituals that make me resent the day ahead. The Catch-22 is that when I don’t do them, i.e take a break, I end up feeling worthless, unproductive, and undeserving of any sympathy. I don’t want to be easy on myself. I want life’s hardship to make me a fucking better writer. I want it to fundamentally change how I approach a day. I want to feel something, and breathe beautiful air, gasping for my next breath because if I don’t I will surely die. What do I get instead? Lying in bed because it is too damn hard to sit up. Somedays I’m so happy, I can’t even fall asleep. Today, all I did was try to remember why I dream.

    Instagram: Bencbon

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  • The Alchemist – Book Synopsis/Review

    This was one of those books that when you pick up and read it, you feel like the voice of God is coming through Paulo Coelho’s writing. It is no doubt that his writing derives from mysticism, magic, and a great understanding of The Soul of the World. His mysterious past includes pilgrimages, songwriting, and insane asylums. He writes poetry in his prose. Every page reads like a sonnet. It is a perfect example of simple language having the ability to compel.

    The story follows a young boy from Spain. He is a Shepard who has a dream that if he goes to the Pyramids he will find treasure. A gypsy woman says she will interpret the dream for 1/10th of the treasure. She confirms that he must pursue his dream to make it a reality. A wise old man who claims to be a king, explains that the boy has to fulfill his Personal Legend. Everybody has a Personal Legend. However, most people do not search it out. “To realize one’s Personal Legend is a person’s only obligation.” The boy sells his sheep and sets out to Africa. On his first day, he is tricked and loses all of his gold so he takes a job with a crystal shop owner. The crystal owner explains that the dream of going to Mecca was his Personal Legend and keeps him alive, even though he will never pursue the dream. After one year of working at the crystal shop, the boy has enough money to go back home. However, he meets an Englishman who intrigues him about alchemy. The Englishman shows the boy his books. The Englishman is an example that reading does not equate to understanding. Together they set out into the desert to find the two-hundred-year-old alchemist and arrive at an oasis. There, the boy falls in love with a girl named Fatima. She is a woman of the desert and understands that the boy has to leave and fulfill his journey so that he may come back. Some women of the desert spend their whole lives for their men to return. The boy meets the alchemist who helps him on his way to the Pyramids. They are stopped and threatened to be killed but the alchemist explains that the boy can turn himself into the wind. The boy asks for help from the wind who tells him to ask the sun who tells him to ask the Soul of God. He learns that the Soul of God is his own. The boy performs a miracle. He and the alchemist are allowed to move forward in their journey. The Alchemist shows him how to turn metal into Gold. When he arrives at the Pyramids he begins to dig a hole and is stopped by two men. One of the men tells him that he had a dream of finding treasure under a sycamore tree in Spain, but wasn’t foolish enough to believe it. The boy understands that this is where the treasure is. He goes back to Spain where discovers the treasure and returns to his love from the desert, Fatima.

    This book is just a beautiful, simple story. It has heart. It is meaningful. It will ground you. Do not miss out on this book, it has the power to change your life. It is filled will many life lessons and things to take away. The journey is powerful. It might help you understand your own Personal Legend, and give you the courage to pursue it.

    92/100

    Instagram: Bencbon

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  • year one

    If I was to look back at all the emotions I felt this past year, I would admit that they were significantly less compelling than previous years. I pulled all-nighters, I laughed, I cried, but I didn’t jump off a four-story building, or bike to California. I worry that if I don’t kindle my little flame of insanity, I will lose it. Nevertheless, this has been the best year of my life and I didn’t even have to do anything. Today marks one year sober. It is everything I imagined I would have to do to win back the trust of those I hurt. I imagined this day through the five years I tried to achieve it, the speeches I would give sharing my wisdom, the phone calls to ex-girlfriends, my shiny new coin. What I didn’t imagine is where I would be in my life, and I think that is what makes my life a satirical black comedy. I get what I want, but it is nothing that I wanted. I’d much rather be a published author in some ditch shooting up. Some advice I was once given has been turning over in my head. None of those external affirmations matter because you (i.e me) are a good person. Why does it feel like people who attain success don’t know how to appreciate it. If you are a young writer I’m not talking about you. I don’t know who I really hold a grudge against these days but I’d much rather be someone else. I don’t want every right of passage to be sour and jaded. Walk to New York, took a bus home. Biked to California, broke both my legs. One year sober, the party is over. Another piece of advice I was given was that I shouldn’t live my life for others, or because of others. I would never achieve my goals if the prize was someone’s affection or my father’s trust. I had to do it for me. What a lovely bunch of bullcrap. I am not enough. I might have the foresight to know you are not enough either, but together we might go twice as far. I don’t do good with achieving my goals. It is a good reason to relax. I’ve done nothing this whole year. I don’t deserve a cake. I will also say that a year is a hell of a lot shorter than I remember. I can already smell next Christmas. Everything else from my childhood will surely fade into the background, so I don’t see any reason why I shouldn’t grow up as well. I’m a stupid stubborn man-child. I hope someday somebody sees that for as much of a failure I feel like, I tried to persevere so that somebody might recognize a glimmer of hope in the idea that they are not alone. I don’t feel alone. I feel like we are all alone. Hallucinating a mirage of mystic mayhem that passes for a 9 to 5. What a great fucking year, let’s hope.

    Instagram: Bencbon

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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.