Be Safe

[00:13.72] There is no me
[00:15.06] The mask stifling but it's eye holes so I can see how to set you at ease
[00:19.61] You at the job interview, you moving raw in the streets
[00:23.39] Either way I be the nigga you need me to be
[00:25.97] Fit like a glove
[00:27.79] Polyurethane inner sleeve
[00:29.75] I won't lie though, everything a bit muffled, hard to taste
[00:33.29] Every breath smuggled, shoulders ache from the weight
[00:35.83] Still in all, it's a small price to be safe (be safe)
[00:39.46] To be safe (be safe)
[00:41.17] Childhood photos kept as keepsakes
[00:43.32] I won't lie, I barely recognize the face
[00:46.26] Be careful lest it break
[00:48.26] Beware it slip while you in the wrong place
[00:50.24] Mine rubber cement and gorilla glue, yours held together with duct tape
[00:55.09] Water filter brackish
[00:57.15] Esophagus brim with acid, nothing said
[00:59.80] Approval tacit
[01:01.03] Lead rub off when you grasp it
[01:02.95] Inside, sour sweat, cheap plastic
[01:08.99] Used to be a relief to come home, take it off, roll a cone
[01:13.06] But putting it back on a problem all it's own, so now no
[01:16.54] I think it's grown
[01:17.84] Burrowed, grafted to bone, who knows?
[01:20.49] Face like Play Doh, even alone
[01:23.56] Laugh like Styrofoam when I realize I don't cross the street no more
[01:27.56] They staring at they phones
[01:29.28] Can't be
[01:30.83] You can't be
[01:32.42] You can't be
[01:34.22] You can't be
[01:35.95] You can't
[01:39.27] My wandering may come with a price
[01:41.83] My nerves bad, forever ominous
[01:44.33] So goth I was born Black, ever vigilant
[01:46.94] Antenna extremity, lights out
[01:49.32] Feeling through the most ordinary of times
[01:51.78] Scanning eyes, from yea high
[01:53.73] To absorb abuse considered normalized
[01:55.94] Coated in this core design, fortified
[01:58.64] Stay out of stores without the red slide
[02:00.89] Raising black children in the pedagogy of surrender for their betterment
[02:04.66] Fuck that old world rhetoric
[02:06.40] World gon' burn, bring the accelerant
[02:08.75] A measured risk at every turn
[02:10.50] When you say it it's cool, when I speak it you need evidence?
[02:13.88] Deader things, never just so, it's never just so
[02:16.99] Felt all federal levels to every ghetto
[02:19.79] And I can't say that, even when I feel that
[02:22.61] Even if I can't find the words to articulate fact that doesn't make it less true, when I take refuge
[02:28.34] Ever evolved for sophisticated stressors
[02:30.88] At the tip, sip the nectar
[02:32.57] Tell me how you know so much about systems that don't affect you
[02:35.77] Trauma talk
[02:36.72] Rae and law, barrel of Barama spark
[02:39.05] Karma lie
[02:40.23] Some get over, some get by
[02:41.98] Can't be mediocre, can't overachieve
[02:44.32] Don't just stand there, why are you even breathing?
[02:46.66] Who told you to fear they're not being facetious?
[02:49.39] Peep it
[02:51.54] You can't
[02:53.30] You can't be
[02:55.85]