American I Live

LETRA

American I Live

Racial reconciliation
My skin colour don't exclude me
My skin colour include me
Who me? I'm a part of the conversation
My children's Bible ain't had no pictures that look like me
So DMX was the pastor I used to console me
The Bible was written in truth but it was taught in error by those that never told me I could be holy, (Salute)
They hate on the Bible, still hating on the Bible
400 years later found out we in the Bible
They lied to the slaves and told them that we wasn't
Our skin dark like Jesus we resembled His brothers
Truth ain't covered, the cat's out the bag like Publix
Or a Jag underneath that plastic bag all smothered
My people perished for a lack of understanding
Tried to make us feel like we embarrassed and abandoned
But I know I'm royal flesh, I'm about to turn my hand in
My B.I.B.L.E tucked, look, I'm clutching lamb skin
Skin soiled up, my pigment the colour of trees
I'm God-given I don't belong in a prison, my breathing is different
I don't blow smoke, no weed in my system
Forever cooking up, I'm always leaving the kitchen
I'm forever looking up
My spirit mirror His image
My heart is grenade, baby I finna blow any minute
I'm from where I last repented
From where I asked for forgiveness
That's my old address, you got the holy key to enter
I don't know, all I know was I was on course to be a menace
Till that glow came on myself, from head to toe I'm reinvented
Reading scrolls, body full of holes, bleeding through my clothes
My church clothes got stained, from a past that was so profane
If I say I'm looking for angels, I ain't out here looking for wings
My president is black, 8 years, and still ain't nothing changed
Never trade a state official for a KING, that's the key
(that's the key, that's the key)

How you know the truth
If they never tell you the truth
Studies that show our self approve
I just can't be believing it is what it is
Just because you say it is, what it is

Oh, look
I'm the ex-addict with the teacher, cookin' in his basement lab
Connected with a past
And now I'm making good by breaking bad
Connected to a pastor like I'm Meagan Good, I prayed for that
So my control is limited and trust me this my saviour rap
Mmm pardon me please, funeral for my chill
My current calm as the seas
Beautiful eulogy
If you live in bondage asleep
Peep the war in the streets
And the evil forces that creep
And then leak up out of our speech
Law enforcement like reefer, they keep it harder to breathe
I was Eric Garner and thought that they feelings spoke to my seed
No peace, 'cause then we eager to see an officer bleed
Ain't it deep
Rather get coffins than think to call the police, you can see
Carnivore teeth cause we eatin' all of this beef
And it's eating gone Gomorrah, our modern Sodom indeed
So when E-shon gave the call to have me a part of this beat
I'm like please
Sword is unleashed have you seen how gorgeous my feet is beneath
So more can receive this and beast like four-footed creatures
My team of warriors kill bull
That means we over your league
They roamin' like little Caesars, I need an order some pizza 'cause what is they holy key to a door that's open for me
Come up hangin' with thieves
Get a murderin' sentence
He end up hangin' with thieves
Because the murderous sinners pray for the women
C came to murder the murder centers
He made the period bleed, Jesus murdered the sentence
That's the key

Yeah, I have been
Walking with a target on my back
Searching for the truth I been departed from the fact
Bullets in the bodies of my brothers on the road
Silent suffocation, where they blood is turning cold
True
I got a mighty sword from God, Almighty for it
Free
I've been fighting wars since a tiny boy
Three
I was on the edge of the highest cliff
Don't jump
Could'a been da mans or the lighter spliff, for what, don't know
Battling sin, confidence and, the prophets said [? attention] we got permission from God the witness, the Bible [?] so stop
Not to mention acknowledging the impoverished and the fatherless from the continent we work the [?] to stop until we drop
I knew a black man shot by the cops
He dropped tired
The cops said "put your hands up" but (*shot's fired*)
I know a cop who got killed by a black man for his badge
The black man gave no warning and all you heard next was a blap, blap (*actual gun shot and shell drop*)
You've been avoiding the poison exploiting our daughters
The choice is yours you can force it, toy with the starter
You can point to the Lord and enforce what He offers
But you endorse all the noise then enjoy it and prosper, you in extortion is disproportionate proper
Orbiting all our mortgages, filling morgues with our fathers of course this misfortune
I just wanna hear my kids
I can barely manage this, man
Ameri-can I live

American I live (x6)