Bukowski Was Right

“One day someone will say Bukowski was right.”

—Charles Bukowski, People are Pointless

And when that day comes —
people will gasp, clutch their pearls, and slap a suicide hotline number underneath it.

Because obviously, if someone sees the world like that,
they’re two steps from a noose,
half a pill bottle from the void,
crying for help in 12-point Courier.

But here’s my take:

If you don’t feel this way —
if you’ve never sat in the silence and felt the absolute absurdity of everything —
then your life is already over.

Because you’ve bought the lie.

You’ve swallowed the brochure version of life —
the one where you go to school, buy the house, have the kids, max out the 401(k),
and call it a fucking triumph when you die of manageable sadness.

Bukowski saw the rot and kept writing.
That’s the point.

He didn’t die when he realized people were pointless.
He lived.
He burned.
He drank and fucked and bled and howled through the cracks
because he knew that if you’re going to be alive in this world,
you better be alive like it fucking matters.

The suicide hotline isn’t for people who see the truth.
It’s for people who see the truth and haven’t figured out what to do with it yet.

So here’s what you do:

You stop pretending it’s all okay.
You stop polishing your personality for likes.
You stop using hope as a pacifier and start using rage as fuel.
You stop waiting for meaning and start making it —
by writing, by kissing, by screaming, by showing the hell up with your heart still beating and your eyes wide open.

Yes — people are pointless.
So stop wasting your time trying to be one of the good ones.

Be the honest one.
Be the awake one.
Be the last motherfucker in the room who’s not lying to themselves.

That’s not depression.
That’s freedom.