Death of Innocence

The day I realized I was grown up was the day my innocence died.

Suddenly honest mistakes were malicious acts of terror. Over night the world saw me as evil, untrustworthy. I was no longer a child, therefore I am evil.

I am an adult, therefore it is all an elaborate scheme.

Accidentally bought the wrong ticket as a child? Shit happens, don’t worry about it.

Accidentally bought the wrong ticket as an adult? You did this on purpose.

Suddenly, adults see you as an adult and they see their own greed in you, even though you never knew it existed in you in the first place.

They see their own evil plans in you, yet you never thought you had them in you.

Do we become the monsters others see in us, or do we all grow into them?

Do the demons that haunt the world pass down to their children because they get told they are already lost?

They always say no-one is born evil.

Yet when does it happen?

When honest mistakes can’t exist anymore, because there is no honesty over the age of 10? Or when we tell teenagers, young adults, that from now on we will see them as one of us.

Greedy, selfish, untrustworthy, already given up, so we might as well fuck everything up.

That's the true hurt of growing up, the longing for the innocence others saw in you, not the vile beast that awoke in their eyes overnight.