[Chorus: Lalah Hathaway]
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black

[Verse 1: Common]
To be young, gifted and black and own it
It's more than a moment
It's like the sun rose to condone it
Before we was trapping we was trapped in
Sun and the whips kissing our black skin
Strange fruit hanging, smell the jasmine
Rock to Coltrane, listen to jazz then, back then
We came with names like James, Fatima
Nina, King, dreamer
Redeemer of the people
Songs for the heaple
Original, spiritual content
You can smell it when it's God-sent
We keep it moving everyday, we the target
The young, gifted and black on the market
Cause of that we pay with our lives
Or either catching charges
But yo, the goddess is in God's ears
Young, gifted and black
[Chorus: Lalah Hathaway]
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black

[Verse 2: Common]
Mississippi goddam, Ferguson goddam
Staten Island goddam, Baltimore goddam
America damn
I tell you who I am, but you don't understand
Across the waters I swam, son and daughters of the land
Yeah we the black sheep but you slaughtering the lamb
You try to silence with your sirens
Sounds of violence do nothing but divide us
Evolution of revolution retribution, it's due us
The old ways of the US, it ain't the new us
Tell em we the stars, they can't shoot us
Through prisons and wars, you could no longer recruit us
Salvation is due us
Even before we came, God knew us
God knew us
Yeah, God know us

[Chorus: Lalah Hathaway]
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
Young, gifted and black
To be young, gifted and black
[Skat: Lalah Hathaway]