Outlier

Born into a world of
Unforgiving expectancy where
Standards are high and never faltering,
I can't help but feel isolated.

The society which is mine
Requires perfection with ease,
Error is sin, mediocrity forbidden.
Terror within the depths of each
Child drives them to strive for
What they cannot reach - to sit
Atop the bar as a picture perfect star
In celebrity they can only beseech.

Most will not achieve the
Image they need, but will
Continue to seek a way to assimilate,
Despite the cost, the consequence,
The time, the diligence, all of which
Are wasted in the pursuit to transofrm
Into something distorted and untrue.

Perhaps they'll turn to options unnatural,
Traveling to places within themselves
They did not know could exist, for they
Cannot resist the compelling urge to get
Their name on the list of high-ranking
People - those that are longed for and cool,
All the while they're only in school,
Unaware that if they had the guts to dare
To abstain, they'd laugh at the rest
When self-worth became the thing to obtain.

They give up their sense of self
To morph and deform into just another
Soldier in the army of pathetic pretty people.
Contentment within is not nearly enough, so
It is cortizone and silicone they use to
Buffer up, to augment their pride.

I can no longer hide my unhappiness
And discontent with what I see.
The sight is disgusting, while shocking,
Enraging beyond belief.
I do not, and will not, understand the
Motive behind leading a life ignorant and
Blind, a life of false hope, false image,
False desire, while I attempt to aspire
In this world in which success means
Selling myself to become someone else.

I am an outlier on the chart that
Maps my society, lying far from
The rest, and it's something I refuse to detest.
All I wish is for them to extrapolate,
Not so that I am removed from their presence,
But so that they are gone from my every sense,
So I cannot see the destruction of individuality,
So I cannot hear the talk of fake reality,
Nor smell the cloud of manufactured scent that
Engulfs their complacent mentality.
Leave me out of this distorted desire,
So that I may rest easy knowing
I am true to myself.