[Verse 1: Brother Ali]
Alright, okay, let's get it situated
I spit directly from the people that originated
All of that shit you faking, think that imitation is amazing
You need to fix your faces quickly 'for your spirit get eliminated
I've been initiated, strictly by invitation
To the order of the Samurai, so this is sacred
Revealing by right, he's heat but I'm light
He feel it shine bright, deleting all hype
I'm not shining, I'm glowing, every rhyme is a poem
You been already knowing, I been trying to told 'em
Still grinding and groping, still prying it open
Still divinely controlled and I honour the moment
Been around the globe and always finding pieces of me
Reason to breath as deep as the sea
Pay the ticket price and speak it for free
Lay my head on any bed and then eventually dream of the key
I arrive clear, no dye here
But the colors of the tears cried here might appear on my beard
Uh, the dust I carry on me is just a ceremony
Because it bears the stories of the ones that came before me
You witness the glory, the gifted oratory
That I distribute as the richness of the poor and holy
They thought the floor could hold me, they thought the sky confined me
They thought the prison of the earthly body might define me
They thought because that God is out of sight, I follow blindly
Anything outside of space and time cannot be timely
Allow me, glad tidings to the strangers
Ain't concerned with being famous or how many hits their page gets
That are happy being nameless, and absent from your papers
And could never be swayed by someone clapping in their faces
Hatred can't degrade them, praise could never raise 'em
Their glamor can't be faded by no passing entertainment
And that's the generation where I catch my inspiration
The manuscript they're saving is the one I scratched my name in
This is by love, to love, through love, true love
Turn the lights down and turn the tune up
[Verse 2: Pharoahe Monch]
I'm that ticket to get you higher than the mezzanine
Nosebleed, methamphetamine
Protein, USDA grade: totally lean
If you holding up the wall, you know what I mean
Promethazine fiend, watch women in lululemon
Female geneticist: I study girls in jeans
Violent with the double-entendres
The weed-whacker that'll strike the bong and hit ganja
Then cut a rug before I drink Mary's blood
Regurgitate it, praise it then raise the murder rate in the club
Sociopath, I will slice the tat off a thug
And then spit a slug in his mug and leave the hands of time with a nub
Sick shit, with a torn meniscus
Dikembe Mutombo ordering jumbo shrimp with a pimp
In Red Lobster eating buttermilk biscuits
I'm proud, young, gifted
Somewhere in between red and green, getting lifted
I'm half of the planet when the sun gets eclipsed
Shit, I'm Steve Harvey at the African Day Parade
Drinking Tanqueray with gators on, playing spades with Issa Rae
Black Jew screaming on New York avenues
I'm blacker than black people's desire for new shoes
Fast, you couldn't catch him if you was Mohamed Sanu
In fact, I'm blacker than running numbers in sou-sous
On a cruise with Patti LaBelle screaming church hymns and blues
The fuck's blacker than that?
Came out the womb on Halloween
With an affinity for thirteen and black cats, does it get any clearer?
Walk barefoot under ladders in a house of broken mirrors
Staring into what I am, space-time continuum
At the minimum, math and helium gases slash
Malware to make your hologram crash
I totally get why you fear me
'Cause I'm what existed before the Big Bang theory, I'm-