The Deepest Wounds

By Bud Koenemund

A 100 Word Story

  I don’t hate you for breaking my heart. In truth, I expected it; waited for “the bomb” to drop right from day one. It’s the story of my life, really; I’m used to it. But, I didn’t expect to be stabbed in the back… the blade killing trust and affection in one thrust.
  Sadly, the deepest wounds are inflicted by those held in closest confidence. Despite the danger, we let them in – even provide them with the weapon – and turn a blind eye to the risk. And, as love bleeds out, animosity and the rot of indifference corrupts the soul.

Lust in the Time of Coronavirus

By Bud Koenemund

Quarantine with me.
Let's get naked and ignore
"social distancing."

My Name is Bud, and I'm an Addict

I wrote this back in July, but didn't post it. Here you go.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi, my name is Bud, and I’m an addict.

On this date in 1998, I had my first hit of “Her.” Like some RomCom cliché, I saw her across a smoky back yard at an anniversary party. It was lust at first sight. And, when I got close enough to look in her eyes, I was in love.

We were so different – think Dharma and Greg – and yet meshed so well. She inspired so many words, and left me speechless. She filled my spirit even as she took away my breath. It was, I thought, what love was supposed to feel like.

Sadly, unlike in Hollywood, the boy didn’t get the girl. The boy got hurt over and over. He’d (in a manner of speaking) lose the girl, she’d go away for a while – sometimes years – and he would make strides toward healing. But again and again she’d return, and he’d fall under her spell once more. The boy is, admittedly, not very bright.

There were too many days when I didn’t care if I woke up in the morning. And, despite a fairly impressive collection of writing (quantity, if not quality) inspired by my first muse, I still wake up depressed that I have to drag myself through another day.

A few months ago, with the unwitting help of her latest boyfriend, I got clean. Of course, clean is a relative term. Like any addict, I know I’ll never be free of temptation. The danger of relapse lurks everywhere; in scores of songs and movies; in a thousand memories, and even in the words dripping from my own pen.

I’m better than I was, but I am still damaged. I am a junkie, and “Her” is my drug.

“I thought I knew what love was. What did I know? Those days are gone forever. I should just let ‘em go.”

Healing

For New York City - December 2001

A multi-ethnic mass of humanity
on the street; scurrying, bumping, jostling
without even a mumbled apology.
Bodies rushing everywhere; and nowhere.
People from around the world; here now
the artists and the crackpots,
the addicts and their crack-pipes,
and half-naked cowboys in Times Square.

Visitors craning their necks, looking skyward,
walking slowly along the broad sidewalks
taking countless pictures of the Big City;
holding hands tightly as if it will swallow them up!
They take in the fantasy-like glimmering
beauty filled with blazing neon signs
hiding the dark reality underneath
with their glowing sensuality.

I feel so perfectly at home here
in this place of bold, black strokes
and colorful, wildly psychedelic metaphors
here at the crossroads of the universe;
where even the wildest of dreams
can come amazingly true.
A place where I can find myself
and become lost in the crowd.

The power of this city radiates
up and down the wide Avenues of legend,
across the Streets of lore,
and through every building in between.
No place in the world can compare
to all of its glitz and glamour,
or to the always exciting hint of danger
hiding just under the surface.

The real strength of this great city
rests not in its buildings, but in its people!
It lies in their diversity and their character,
in their determination and their resolve!
It is the weird, and the wonderfully strange,
as well as the everyday normal people
that make this city what it is.
I love this City!