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Sep 2020 · 83
counterfeit fight
Josiah Bates Sep 2020
She tells me she does...
She tells me much more,
There isn't much she doesn't tell
When she yells at my heart's door.

She texts me every morning
She texts me every night,
She refuses to talk in person though
She fights the counterfeit fight.

She says how we're meant for each other
She says how we're meant to be
There's a lot she says about us, and our plans
When in the end, she doesn't care about me.
Oct 2019 · 590
ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ
Josiah Bates Oct 2019
Sitting on its haunch,
Bear drinking river water.
Alone. Safe. Secure.
ʕᵔᴥᵔʔ
A random Haiku sort of thing about how my day went.
Oct 2019 · 228
They
Josiah Bates Oct 2019
I do not approve of what they do,
Yet I love them         just the same.

I cannot accept what they think and say,
But I accept them          for who they are.

They hurt the people that I love the most,
And I hurt                to forgive them again

If they were you, they'd be easier to love.
Yet I am the source                of the blame.
Oct 2019 · 391
You.
Josiah Bates Oct 2019
I Fumble through the dark
Hopeless.            Stray dog.
I lie there in constant thought. of
You.

Found myself by rambling
through carefully spoken paragraphs,
flattering speeches and romantic monologues.
but they are nothing, without
You.

Nothing, after all
That's all that I ever was to
You.
So I'll be nothing, I am silence…
Yet I hear your piercing whispers!
I am steeled against myself.
But your knife plunges into my empty chest.
Who is guilty of the sin in the end?!

Me.
Oct 2019 · 1.0k
Dragon Flower Meadow
Josiah Bates Oct 2019
A daisy in a dragon flower meadow
water turns to lead
the air tastes metallic

A flower among weeds that grow so tall
a flower spreading seeds, hoping that, come fall
another daisy will bloom.

Come, fall, to the dragon flower meadow,
so that what we said when we were alone
will at last, like dust, settle.
Oct 2019 · 447
Peach Hill
Josiah Bates Oct 2019
The sky over peach hill
Was dulcet last I looked,
Without a hint of clammy March
In the middle of a bright July

The sky over peach hill
Had clouds surrounding the kites,
My girl and I would stare for hours
As hot-air balloons passed by

That sky over peach hill
Ever soft, ever sweet.
That was the place where I found
That life passes in a sigh

The peaches fell,
And august came.
My girl went away,
I was left behind.

The sky over peach hill
Looks a little darker now.
But I know once winter ends
The kites will fly again
Sep 2019 · 1.3k
Untitled
Josiah Bates Sep 2019
Hey.
I know it's late.
I'm sorry for keeping you up.
Do you still love me?

Sorry.
I know it's annoying,
that I ask that all the time
I just wanted to make sure...

Do you?
...
oh
...
Sep 2019 · 528
Kellen's Burrito
Josiah Bates Sep 2019
Kellen’s Burrito
Filled with raw beef and moldy blue cheese
Tastes like Kobe’s hair
It tastes like fleas

The burrito is tasty
But not in the right way
It’s tasty like burnt toast
From a toaster powered on a subway rail

Nobody knows how it tastes but I
Nobody cares to try
The burrito is very tasty
do you want a bite?
(a joke poem for a friend)
Sep 2019 · 87
The Facade
Josiah Bates Sep 2019
he is limited
by what he cannot feel
he knows with ev'ry strand of his being
he is horribly flawed

he is alone
not quite deathly alone
but the silence kills him
just the same

he puts me away
It's a prison.
and behind the glares
I am the sole inmate.

he is the bird
I am the sky
but when he flies
what do you see?

we have the same interests,
but cannot be friends.
we have the same friends,
but he is their interest.

he lacks humility
he lacks a heart
he has no depth at all
but he goes so far.

People like him,
they don't like me...
Am I Jealous?
Heavens, no!
I just wish he was actually me.

I would tear him apart
rip him seam to seam
but then I would hurt him
and I want to keep this "me" pristine.
One line four of stanza one, I originally wrote "cadaverously" in the stead of horribly. I realized that a longer word there would make it less readable.

— The End —