The Accepted Poem by Rose Kirby

Moving on to pastures new
Found my self tangled in strangers twine
And counting all the folk I knew
A grand total of none

But something walking past the flock
Boots scuffed to the nines
Caught the eye of a girl
Wearing bleak tinted spectacles

Head tilted slightly to one side
In a naive attempt to strike up conversation
But as I begin to talk
An explosion of laughter forces her away

“Who’s she? ” I gave a voice to them
“She’s an emo.” “But who is she? ”
“She’s a freak.” “No, who is she? ”
“What is wrong with you? ” I care too much apparently.

Three weeks pass by and I can stand no more
I fell through the pitch black of loneliness
In a last ditch attempt to grab at popularity
I clung to the dizzy blonde inferno of yet another clique

But, alas, it was not meant for me
My Matalan school uniform grew an arrow print
And my black-and-white striped arm warmers became handcuffs
Tying me to everything they said was fact

Now I know that the space between heads and hearts is a constructive plate boundary
Spurts out magma when they conflict
But something must be made in a constructive plate boundary
Ground appears, for the flowers of escape to grow

I hate my logical side
It told me to put up with secondary school hell
And said I should ignore my feelings in favour of being “girly”
I suppose you could say, my feelings were “compressed to impress”

My heart, however, was an entirely different matter
It was “depressed, I confess”
An assumption many feel obliged to make
To explain the fact I’m just not like anyone else

“I beg to differ” a rule I chose to live by
Being different is a curse I’m forced to embrace
And I can romanticise it all I want
But it won’t help the fact no-one will accept it

Well, sir or ma’am, is my poem any good?
Is it what you were looking for?
Am I any good?
Am I what you were looking for?

Probably not.
Nothing will change.
Never alter
The Accepted.