Letras
Peace to the ancestors
Yes
Peace to Dr. Cornel West
Yes
Peace to the movement
Yes
We came from the bottom
Ever since they got us we been going through these problems
Four hundred years behind and it's no promise
And we gon' never 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 or slang
Now we locked up again
How much can our skin take?
We went from slaves to inmates
Carrying the weight of the fifty states
Working your farms
Black nannies carrying white babies in they arms
Black men sacrificed they 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 us in the streets like a 808 bass
America, when will you defend my case?
You never will 'cause your freedom is fake
I'm only living here 'cause I wanna get paid
Enough to round up all my family and shake
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
Get up, get up
They done tore down all the PJ's in my barrio
Gang units for worst case scenarios
Might work, still a couple of quirks
Can't call it pancakes 'cause you poured some syrup
It's a whole lot bigger than a pretty new house
Especially when the rodents 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 hanging Saddam
Troops still riding, still obliging
Still no Bin Laden
Tuned in waiting for the President's announcements
No forty acres, take these forty ounces
We ain't gon' get on the levees
Revolution televised early
Is you ready?
America, why you wanna treat me so cold?
America, I done gave you all that I own
America, took me from my mama so young
America, locked me up and gave me your name
Uh, when you steady being forced to climb
The shit'll have you back heavy beating, lost your mind
Especially when you done been down for so much time
Getting up don't even really ever cross your mind
You got pawn shop, gun shop, liquor store sign
SWAT team, crack fiend, unemployed line
Day late, dollar short, trying to buy time
What we do to survive is defined as a life of crime
You can't ball then you 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 calls cost a dime
What it made me is one of the relevant
Highly intelligent brothers not only
Dealing with the same drug selling
If I'm a hustler then what's more American?
We all founded on the same strong heritage
America, why you wanna treat me so cold?
America, I done gave you all that I own
America, took me from my mama so young
America, locked me up and gave me your name
America, America, America
You know the black freedom movement
Constitution, moral conscious
You know we been trying to redeem the soul of the nation
Even as that nation been trying to render us soulless
We are a soulful people, a blues people
We been keeping alive the bloodstained banner of democracy
Thank God for those who came before
We shall never forget them and always
Move forward with grace and dignity
America, why you wanna treat me so cold?
America, I done gave you all that I own
America, took me from my mama so young
America, locked me up and gave me your name
America, why you wanna treat me so cold?
America, I done gave you all that I own
America, took me from my mama so young
America, locked me up and gave me your name