growing pains in a different form (poem?)

i scurry around my house, late at night. tail tucked between my thighs. ive never had a job, and i have no skills and i am turning 18 in 5 months. i cry to dreams of the woods but everyday i feel it is an excuse. its not meant for me, not truly. yet i think of my times camping, running around in my boxers and a tshirt at night, the sky so lit up with stars your convinced if you climb a tall enough tree you can run your fingers through the milky way. seeing a shooting star so big and bright it feels like a gift meant just for you. a loving message from the universe. the air so fresh and the water so clear pollution seems like something youve never heard of. and i wore my hat with ears and i let myself believe i was meant to stay there. but then i am dragged back to my school in downtown and the air reeks of piss and theres a code yellow for someone jerking off in our lobby and i have to talk to my counselor about another failed class and i am forced to accept there is no escaping this. i hide cigarettes in my bag and the withdrawal makes a depressive episode that much more sour. 7 year old me would look at this life and see me living as a boy and ask "why are you wasting this? why are you throwing away my life" and she would cry and run under the covers to talk to the wolves that live there. but yet i feel hopeless. what can i give this little girl aside from empty promises and a broken heart? i yearn to be her again but its a purely selfish want as she didnt even want to be herself. i look at her sometimes and want to give her the dream of running in the woods until my feet are bloody and build myself a wooden home against a rock but not even that is free. so today i untuck my tail and i draw a page in my sketchbook and that is all i can do for now, and tomorrow i will go outside and look at job listings. because i was never really happy as that little girl but maybe years from now i will be happy, and i will have a clear view of the milky way.