The Pressure to Know
Shyla the Super Gecko

The blue Victorian at the T in the road
Is surrounded by gray mist minions.
This little blue home is not alone –
Gray mist pressuring from the outside onto souls –
Pressuring from the outside so intensely
Our head and chest and waist; legs and arms,
These feel the pressure, the pressure on our homes.

Gray mist with no form pushing, pressuring –
Like demons devouring what needs doing.
Outside our homes the dangers of life –
So our barrier, our excuse, our tough-it-out
Is a loose safety valve turned too tight.

Gray mist holds us hostage
When all we want is to be arrested –
To shout and say we are in support
Of no man being targeted by guns or racist thoughts –
Of no woman working three jobs to give her kids a chance.
How do we sleep in dreams of sanctuary
Knowing not everyone is free?

But the pressure of gray mist holds us inside,
Keeps us afraid and makes us hide –
Keeps us quiet and pretends it’s not that bad…
This fear we fear we share today
Is what may ensure we’re all oppressed one day.

Oh, what we would give for this gray mist to leave,
For our legs to work, for our neighbors to see
We don’t agree with racist restructuring –
Or defending leaders as always certain.
This country thrives on you and me –
Honestly, on people seen beneath the collective we.
There is no difference in what all have to give
Only in opportunity to share and live.
Don’t covet another’s talent Corinthians says –

But what are we to do when talent is suppressed,
Is denied, is left in distress?
With the gray mist pounding, pounding on our chests –
Pounding on our doors with a bang which never rests –

We say, “It’s just, it’s just…”
We sit and do nothing, trapped by gray mist.