I try to hold some hope in my heart
For these African youths
Coming up where I'm from

Many traps to elude
Surrounded by
Mostly white and affluent dudes

And somehow, you expected to have
Mastered this smooth
Swagger and move

With the right walk, the right talk
Fashion and crews
Souls subtly attacked and abused

And what's funny's being black wasn't cool
Where I'm from til suddenly
You started hearing rap in the school

Hallways
Admist this madness I grew
With knack for amusing through this little skill

For rappin at dudes
An' we all like to laugh at the truth
But when you young and same facts

Pertain to who you rappin em to
Well, I opted not to bring
That to the booth

But after a while, it sort of starts naggin at you
The crazed infatuation with blackness
That trash that gets viewed

And the fact that the tube only showed blacks
Actin the fool and I was watching...


(saturated with negative images and a limited range of
Possibilities is strange...)


And it's sad cause that naturally do
Sort of condition your mind and over time
That's what's attractive to you

So young blacks don't see themselves in
Scholastic pursuits
Or the more practical routes

It's makin tracks or it's hoops
Or God-forbid movin packs for the loot
Even with this music we so limited - it's rap or produce

And that narrow conception of what's black isn't true
Of course, still we feel forced to adapt to this view
Like there's something that you're havin to prove

Now add that to the slew
Of justification the capitalists use
For the new blaxploitation

Many actions excused
In the name of getting cash
That's adversely impactin our youth

With mental slavery, the shackles is loose
And it's hard to cut chains when they attached at the roots
So what the new black activists do

For our freedom is just being them
Do what you're passionate to
Not confined by a sense that you have to disprove

Any stereotypes, so-called facts to refute
Or match any image of blackness
They've established as true

Perhaps we'll break thru the glass ceilings
Shatter the roof and emerge
From these boxes that they have us in cooped

And grow to smash the bold that they casted of you
I'll keep watching...