Be Safe
[Verse 1: Billy Woods]
There's no me
The mask stifling with his eye holes
So I can see how to set you at ease
You at the job interview
You moving raw in the streets
Either way I be the nigga you need me to be
Fit like a glove
Polyurethane in his sleeve
I won't lie though, everything a bit muffled, hard to taste
Every breath smuggled, shoulders ache from the weight
Still in all, it's a small price to be safe (be safe, to be safe)
Childhood photos kept as keepsakes
I won't lie, I barely recognize the face
Be careful lest it break
But where it slipped while you in the wrong place
Mine rubber cement, gorilla glue, yours held together with duct tape
Water filter brackish, esophagus brim with acid, nothing said
Approval tacit, letting up off 'fore you grasp it
Inside, sour sweat, cheap plastic
Used to be a relief to come home
Take it off, roll a cone, but putting it back on
And problem all it's own, so now I know
I think it's grown, burrow grafted to bone, who knows?
Face like Play Doh, even alone
Laugh like Styrofoam when I realize I don't cross the street no more
They staring at they phones
Can't be
You can't be
You can't be
You can't be
You can't
[Verse 2: Elucid]
My wandering may come with a price
My nerves bad, forever ominous
Siddhartha was born black, ever vigilant
Antenna extremity, lights out
Feeling through the most ordinary of times
Scanning eyes, from yea high
To absorb abuse considered normalized
Coated in this core design, fortified
Stay out of stores without the red (?)
Raising black children in the pedagogy of surrender for their betterment
Fuck that, old world rhetoric
World gon' burn, bring the accelerant
A measured risk at every turn
Would you say it is cool when I speak and truly evidence?
Deader things, never just so, it's never just so
Fuck all federal levels to every ghetto
And I can't say that, even when I feel that
Even if I can't find the words to articulate fact
That doesn't make it less true, when I take refuge
Ever evolved for sophisticated stressors
At the tip, sip the nectar
Tell me how you know so much about systems that don't affect you
Trauma tall, (?), barrel of a (?), (?)
Some get over, some get by
Can't be mediocre, can't overachieve
Don't just stand there, why are you even breathing?
Who told you to fear they're not being facetious?
Peep it
You can't be
You can't be