The wrong path leads to heartless skeletons

I hate how everything is now

I hate how everyone watered my roots with their poison

how my strongest limbs have been sliced from my trunk

how the rich green of my leaves dulls to a mulchy brown as they fall

down

down

down

my hard work

muddied by uncaring feet

people who may actually enjoy seeing my pain

my loss.

These people

they have no heart

it was ripped from their chests long ago

I can't remember when they were kind

when they didn't look down on others with a sneer

wrinkling their nose in distaste at our presences

tossing their hair

stomping off

elbowing anyone and everyone out of their way.

My bark has gotten thicker, true

a stronger wall to keep the acid from touching my delicate rings

rings that I am proud of

but some still seeps in between cracks that were never there

never should have been there.

These people

they treat me like I did something terrible

something putrid and horrid and monstrous

I didn't

all I know is that I came back from school over summer break and I was hated by 70% of my class

who knows why?

I must've taken the right path, then

if such judgmental creatures hated me so

if such unkind skeletons of people treated me like I was crap

I did take the right turn, then

the turn that they didn't take

the turn that looked gloomy and realistic

versus the road they chose;

the bright, sunny fake realities of concealer

the gleaming flowers of mascara

the bright blue sky of blush with streaks of fluffy white eyeliner

they took the fake route

the unrealistic one

I chose reality

I chose knowing what was going on in the world

I didn't choose social media trends

I chose the bleak depression of life

and they can deal with the fact that they fell into a web

sticky with their slimy-looking lip gloss of the souls that came before

the ones who failed to escape in time

of their hearts being ripped out of their chests.