Not A Sad Poem

Part title

This is not a sad poem
Not the kind I'm used to throwing
But here's the first
Pray not the worst
Though badly rehearsed
Are these clumsy verse..s

So here we go..

Most of my life I could never fit in fully
Not ever since I was a wee-
-little 8-year-old wanting to be
Friends with the cool and popular kids, see
I wore wellies with my skirt
Had Darth Vader on my shirt
I was the most nerdiest of nerds
So painfully awkward

Shinobi on Sega Mega Drive
Was my favourite pasttime
So was cricket in the park on bright summer nights
Hot wheels over Barbie
Pinks not really my cup of tea
Don't really fancy jewellery
Some of my idiosyncracies

Fast forward to uni where I read engineering
The social climate was pleasantly less feminine
Went to classes in my baju kurung
Over trainers laces unstrung
Revelled in the recklessness of the reckless and young
It was there I learned to be bold
Joined a rock band, sang Avenged Sevenfold
Made friends with the mavericks
The rebels and the eccentrics
Juggled quadratics with social rubrics
Stick the pricks that took the mick
-out of me

I no longer struggled to conform
Now a windstorm, I must warn
Soft and warm on the inside, but braver than before
To like differently, live fearlessly
Wild a little, unhinged only slightly

I can't sympathise if you can't accept me;
For me, when I offend nobody
I won't conform to your standards if your intentions are backhanded
Looking for someone bland and grounded
Pliant; I can't understand it

So I call everyone here to celebrate
Everyone here who identifies as a renegade
The misfits and free spirits
All those who refuse to submit
To the norms of a hypocrite
They who can't seem to fit-
In; they with unbridled wit
Sometimes deemed inappropriate
Incongruous and absurd..

Well I say embrace absurdity!
As long as you're hurting nobody.

Why be a plain Jane, calm and contained
When you can be a force of nature, a tame hurricane
Strange a little, deranged can't sit still
Only slightly unhinged, not run-of-the-mill
Be outstanding, outlandish
Outrageous from start to finish
Out of place!
Outpopulate the normal until normal is out of date!

And celebrate!
Celebrate as we deviate
From gender biases
The masses that harrass us
With cultural formulas
That survived the ages
That girls should be malleable
Ductile and feeble
Able but sensible
Whose dreams, if too high, are called nonsensical..

All these things I'm expected to be
At the expense of being..me.
The girl with the bright blue wellies and Darth Vader jumper
That no longer wants to blend in;
With the people around her.