Peace to the ancestors
Yes
Peace to Dr. Cornel West
Yes
Peace to The Movement
Yes
[Verse: Iriz]
We came from the bottom
Ever since they got us
We've been going through these problems
400 years behind and there's no promise
That we could ever actually be equal, to be honest
It's messed up how they put us in chains
Kidnapped our language and changed our names
But when we speak ebonics then they call it a shame
They leave us with a couple options:
Rob us, slang
Now we locked up again
How much can our skin take
We went from slaves to inmates
Carrying the weight of the 50 states
Working your farms
Black nannies carrying white babies in their arms
Black men sacrificed their lives in your wars
But you don't ever show appreciation here at home
You treat us so damn wrong
You act like you hate my race
The police, they just beat in the streets, like a 808 bass
America, when will you defend my case?
You never will 'cuz your freedom is fake
I'm only living here 'cuz I wanna get paid
Enough to round up all my family and shake
[Chorus: Lucky Witherspoon]
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
[Verse: Rah Digga]
They done torn down all the PJ's in my barrio
Ganging is the worst case scenario
Might work, steal a couple of corks
Can't call'em pancakes 'til pour some syrup
This a whole lot bigger than a pretty new house
Especially when the rodents is still running about
P-Diddy running marathons
Raising dough
That's going to the school
Where the tax money go?!
Homeland Security
Now there's a phenom
Pacifying folks by hangin' Saddam
Troops still riding, still obliging
Still no Bin Laden
Tune in, wait for the President's announcements
There's no forty acres, take these forty ounces
You ain't gonna get on the levees
Revolution televised early
Is you ready?
[Chorus II: Witherspoon]
America (Ooh)
Why you do you treat me so cold?
America (Ooh)
I done gave you all that I own
America (Ooh)
Took me from my momma so young
America (Ooh)
Locked me up and gave me your name
[Verse: Black Thought]
When you steady being forced to climb
Should've had your back
Now been done lost your mind
'specially when you been down for some much time
Getting up don't really ever cross your mind
You got pawn shop, gun shot, liquor store sign
SWAT team, crack feign, unemployed line
They late, a dollar short, try'na buy time
What we do to survive is defined as life of crime
You can't ball it
Your forced to grind
If you fall, then you crossed the line
And I been putting in work from nine to five
To five to nine, since phone costed a dime
What it made me is
One of the relevant, highly intelligent
Brothers' not only dealing with
The same drug selling shit
If I'm a hustle, then what's more American?
We all founded on the same sub-heritage
[Chorus II: Lucky Witherspoon]
[Enters: Cornel West]
America, America, America
You know the Black Freedom Movement constitutes of the moral and conscious. We have been trying to redeem the soul of a nation even if that nation renders us soulless. We are a soulful people, a blues people. We've been keeping alive in a state of democracy. Thank God for those who came before, we shall never forget them. We will always move forward with grace and dignity!
[Chorus II: Lucky Witherspoon]