The only girls who ever hated me
Were the ones with hair of butterscotch hues and eyes of the ocean’s reflection
The only girls who continue to clasp the nasty memories of me, and keep my former self who is still in their mind
Are the ones who always told me I would never shed my skin
I hope you are content with your way of living, breathing, and feeling, fitting into the easiest puzzle of life that is society, eating away at the flesh of other girls until there is nothing left but an empty skeleton
But yet I am joyful, happy, exhilarated that you in fact get to watch me grow and grow until my brain cannot hold all the knowledge that I have found while running from you
The person who you called ugly, horrendous, I now know is full of beauty and wildflowers
I do not need your halfway friendship, I do not need the knives in my back
I only need myself, and the select few who have watered me through the drought
So watch me blossom into a woman, whilst you stay a girl.

Arianna Skelcher is from a small town in Connecticut, USA. She’s been writing stories and poetry since she was in fourth grade (now a sophomore almost junior in high school), and she has decided that’s what she would enjoy doing with her life. She hopes to publish many more works as an author.