Layla Riley-Hill Poet Free verse

The cold hand

She just wanted help drowning
Everytime she tried speaking
It felt like a cold hand gripping her throat
It felt like racism breathing silence in her mouth
To other It looked like she had been saved
But she knew she had been condemned
To a life without freedom
She couldn't pretend
She didn't want her life to end
She wanted an out
And maybe the cold hand could help

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Danny Derden June 21, 2025 at 11:38 AM Powerful and unflinching, this poem captures the suffocating weight of voicelessness, systemic oppression, and internal despair. Its stark honesty and visceral imagery—“racism breathing silence”—cut deep, exposing a reality often hidden. There’s raw pain here, but also truth, and in that truth, a call to listen, to witness, and to never turn away. Layla Riley-Hill June 21, 2025 at 11:47 AM Thank you that means a lot.