Honest Chaos

Honest Chaos

By Mark BonicaArtsPerforming Arts
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Honest Chaos episodes

  • Winter Solstice on I-95

    It is only a little after dinner,

    but a womb-like darkness has laid down across the highway.
    This being the winter solstice,
    the sky is an endless blanket of blackness
    as if the highway had slid down into the guts of the earth
    instead of running the patch of Maine
    between Portland and Kittery.
    The only lights are cigarette red from the cars in front of me
    and dashing white from the cars northbound.
    We swim down the arteries in our compartments,
    containerized and separated.
    It has been years,
    but Bono still sings through the speakers
    about how he still hasn’t found what he is looking for.
    None of us have, Bono,
    I say out loud to no one
    because I am alone on this journey.
    Not one of us.
    The darkness feels like it should be milkshake thick,
    perhaps even obsidian amber, with our headlights trapped
    and shining forever.
    But instead, the miles slip by like time
    as we each push the gas pedal harder
    to get where we are already destined to be,
    all the colors bleeding into one.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    2 min
  • Closing the Windows

    The thing is

    you don't realize
    this is the last time
    you will close the windows
    this year.
    You close them on a day
    when the sun is sharp
    like angels' wings
    and the air bites your cheeks.
    You're not thinking
    you should turn the stubborn locks
    to seal out the fingers of winter frost.
    You close them one afternoon
    and then it has been two weeks
    or four
    before you notice
    you have been closed in,
    and closed off,
    and the long, gray time has begun.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • Oh, Achilles, you were a sucker

    Oh, Achilles, you were a sucker

    you died and you were forgotten.
    Perhaps not your name
    but who you actually were -
    the details that differentiated you
    from the other brutes on the beach -
    and who knows how much Homer just plain made up
    after a glass or three,
    and he wasn’t one to disappoint the crowd.
    If they wanted a little more blood
    or wanted you to be a little bigger and stronger
    and not actually have had to fight your fear
    well then so be it.
    But that’s not you he’s singing about,
    let’s be clear.
    That’s Homer's Achilles,
    and people are remembering that Achilles,
    the one he made up to turn a little gold.
    They're not remembering what you actually did,
    not what you actually sacrificed -
    not the beautiful children you could have held,
    not the fields you would have tilled,
    not the sunsets you would have pondered
    leaning on your plow
    in your old age
    that you did not have.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    2 min
  • Purpose

    Each of us is born

    with a key-shaped soul -
    we spend our lives
    looking for the moments
    we are meant to unlock,
    where only we are the right answer
    to a question
    otherwise unanswerable.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • Burning a Candle

    I'm burning a candle

    as a metaphor for how short our human lives are,
    us all being poor actors strutting and fretting.
    But this one here
    is a three-wick spiced cardamom candle
    not something extruded from pig fat
    or gathered from hives.
    I won't be lighting a lamp
    courtesy of some whale's song cut short
    by hard men on three year voyages
    out of Nantucket -
    though I may catch the ferry there this summer
    for a day of rubbing elbows with the tourist elite
    none of whom smell like fish
    or have salt plastered to their sun burned faces.
    Indeed, human life is a bit longer
    and a lot less cruel.
    And the candles are plentiful
    if you need one
    to be reminded.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • Not a god

    When you start your day

    by stubbing your toe
    even before you get to the bathroom
    and you know it's an insignificant injury
    in the scope of world tragedy
    but in the moment
    the pain occupies all of your brain
    except for the part still carrying on
    about how you have to pee -
    this
    is a first glimmer
    that the old gods
    are about today.
    But in case you're not ready to believe,
    you'll have cut yourself shaving
    and that tiny slice will bleed
    onto the first shirt you put on
    and so you'll go downstairs
    having dressed yourself twice.
    You'll knock your coffee over
    with a flick of your hand,
    then you'll forget your keys on your way to your car
    and then as you pull out of your neighborhood,
    you'll remember your wallet
    is waiting patiently on the counter for you.
    And you will do a quick calculus -
    can I get through my day with no money?
    what's the chance the police will pull me over?
    and that last one,
    given the other signs
    has you turning around in some stranger's driveway.
    Now your ancestors in that Mediterranean village -
    no, not the ones with the copious crucifixes,
    before them.
    The ones who made the tiny shrines
    tucked into every nook and corner
    where their descendants, closer to you,
    shoved little statues of Mary,
    but those older ancestors had other figures there first.
    They knew when a splash of wine was called for,
    or to place a slice of orange
    or a few almonds.
    And they would tell you,
    based on the morning you are having
    that you have
    with the utmost certainty
    offended a god.
    A small god, most likely,
    but still, what are you?
    Not a god,
    they would tell you.
    And now you,
    having lost touch with the old ways,
    awkwardly pour a bit of your coffee from your travel mug
    onto the mulch by the garage door,
    the threshold of your home and the larger world.
    It's a small gesture,
    but it is noted.
    Somehow from there
    you find yourself moving more deliberately
    and all the lights are green when you roll up to them
    and all the cars seem to have other places to be
    other than in front of you,
    and thus
    somehow,
    you arrive on time.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    3 min
  • Saying goodbye

    So now you have left us,

    having run through the number of your days
    which we did not know were ending,
    but we came upon
    like a fallen tree blocking the road
    just after we rounded the bend.
    We slammed on the breaks
    and everything came to a stop -
    we could see our lives frozen
    in the ice of time
    and we stood outside
    waiting for the sun to melt us
    back into a new reality -
    one without you.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • The colors of change

    The trees blush in reds and yellows

    at the thought of undressing for winter -
    soon they will stand
    brazenly naked,
    gray,
    the color of acceptance and surrender.
    Boney arms are lifted in prayer -
    do not make the snow
    heavy like concrete,
    keep the ice storms away.
    Let the nor'easters go on out to sea
    where the fish can look up and wonder
    at the whirling mystery
    of the airy world.



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • My People

    My people


    married their
    first cousins


    and passed on
    crooked backs


    and congenital
    deafness -


    my people
    scraped desert island hills


    into terraces


    and pleaded
    with the earth -


    my people
    gathered the rain


    in cisterns
    hidden beneath their huts.


     


    There was never
    enough,


    and poverty
    only begets beauty


    and generosity


    in the movies.


    It's only true
    children are fear


    and jealousy.


    And that is why
    my people


    set sail


    and did not


    return.















































    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min
  • The First Day of Spring

    Spoken word.




    See text at https://honestchaos.blogspot.com/2023/06/the-first-day-of-spring.html



    This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit honestchaos.substack.com
    1 min

About Honest Chaos

From the publisher's feed

A poetry, fiction, and spoken word podcast. Completely irregular. Web site: https://honestchaos.blogspot.com/