1. |
||||
We made a home and it went up in flames
But our bodies are something the fire did not claim
On that day
We were just making plans to stay
And then our house burned down
While everything changed
Y'all, I am not the same
Got loved ones who made it to an early grave
I got loved ones who shouldn't but they carry the weight
It's nobody's fault, but some want somebody to blame
Usually the mirror is the place that they aim
But I don't want to lose nobody else to shame
Our house burned down, we lost it all in a day
Bare feet in the street, we were all we could take
That was more than enough, just that we made it out safe
Without a house but a village we would find our way
Never felt loved like we did the next day
Sometimes you run and life is all you can take
We're breathing in an era where the air isn't safe
It was COVID, and the smoke had covered the whole state
From tear gas to wildfires the worlds ablaze
Change is so sudden, here nothings the same
Years pass but the trauma remains
Compounded into levels it gets hard to explain
Some days you give thanks for the rain
And work to build a home out the ashes again
We made a home and it went up in flames
But our bodies are something the fire did not claim
On that day
We were just making plans to stay
And then our house burned down
While everything changed
We made a home and it went up in flames
But our bodies are something the fire did not claim
On that day
We were just making plans to stay
And then it all burned down
While everything changed
|
||||
2. |
||||
What is home when it turns on you?
Yo, my house is on fire
Homelands on fire
Neighborhoods on fire
The whole world's on fire
Damn
I was outcasted at an early age
A child of conflict in so many ways
At night, thieves of life roam streets til the light
Let off a violent lullaby, what's normal is horrifying
I wish I had an alibi, but I was in the midst
Of a whole war zone called growth in the 6
Where you don't ever feel like your city wants you to live
Children, carry guilt for surviving this prison
Made of city blocks where they predicted we'd be victims
It took vision, plus a mother's intuition
One-way travel just to see something different
I left like she left, on the eve when a war crept
Before the time when most of our folks fled
There was probably less than thirty Habesha then
It's multiplied now by tens of thousands
How cycles repeat when we reach the Southend
We were forced here, now we can't afford the housing
So my folks keep scattering around the map
"Back home" means the opposite of where you at
The ones you left tell you quietly, don't come back
Rumors of war in the motherland
I'm struggling in this other land
My brother's got a gun in hand
But I don't want to run again, no
Rumors of war in the motherland
And we can't get no money in
And you see what the hunger did
We do what we can for the fam
I'm a Southend-made, Beacon Hill-raised,
Child of the District, these neighborhoods claim
Bones of my loved ones who've passed away
Some were shot down even during a plague
A few decades gone, and the song don't change
We couldn't stop it then so we carry the shame
These groups in more ways than not are same
Keep each other just close enough to aim
Reflections blood-stained, communities share pain
Nobody wins when a life's taken away
So young, mothers bury their sons and wonder
Why did we leave where we're from to come under
A new kind of fire where the country doesn't love us
Police don't protect us, they lock our babies in chains
We love 'em with all we got, pray they make it home safe
Never once feeling like a citizen of these states
Rumors of war in the motherland
I'm struggling in this other land
My brother's got a gun in hand
But I don't want to run again, no
Rumors of war in the motherland
And we can't get no money in
And you see what the hunger did
We do what we can for the fam
What is home when it turns on you?
Is it still home? Was it ever home?
You know now that home is
where the hate is, where the heart
knows no peace and so it goes,
falling to pieces.
Try to keep it together as you run
for cover, as you rush to gather
essentials for your escape. Go
and keep going. And dare
to look back at the devastation.
Be still and remember that dust
is the source of life.
|
||||
3. |
||||
If I could show you what my home really meant
In the time before hellfire swallowed it
You'd get a sense that nothing's permanent
Even here, things could go so quick
Humankind, I think we're all so sick
But in the rubble still beauty exists
It's been a war in my homeland for more than
I've been alive, all them years combined
Even in times of peace it was lies
Under the surface some tribes were denied
I always knew we had a sense of false pride
But the stolen land, and the lost lives
Were something new to me
I used to see the country beautifully
But never truthfully
Youthful and free, you could say naive
Child of the east, raised in the west
They only tell you bout their best and leave out the rest
Who got sacrificed, who got left
And who's still suffering yet
Lake Tana sunsets where my soul cries
I've been longing for this moment for my whole life
And I've been wanting all our people to be alright
But I'm feeling like I'm getting hit from all sides
Addis nights, rocking mics in the stage lights
I've been longing for these moments for my whole life
And I've been wanting all our people to be alright
But I hear them bullets flying now from all sides
You could tell a tourist by the scuffs on they shoes
On dirt roads they haven't learned how to move
I'm far removed from knowing what's true
About a country where the news is only one view
But I know enough to know I don't know enough
And neither does anyone who's not in the midst
Of a region where they're in danger of getting hit
Ethiopia has never been a monolith
We got Oromo and Amhara and Somali folks
We got Tigrayan and Sidama and Gurage folks
Indigenous nations, at least 80 more of those
Growing up I only knew about who stayed close
Lived 30 years before the day I ever came home
And who we met then helped me heal my soul up
It wasn't the same country my folks spoke of
Now there's a reckoning of what we know to be us
Lake Tana sunsets where my soul cries
I've been longing for this moment for my whole life
And I've been wanting all our people to be alright
But I'm feeling like I'm getting hit from all sides
Addis nights, rocking mics in the stage lights
I've been longing for these moments for my whole life
And I've been wanting all our people to be alright
But I hear them bullets flying now from all sides
Tigray
I dream of returning to you next time to stay,
and reclaiming what was lost when I first fled.
I dream of who I might've been holding hands
with who I've become, inspired and in solidarity.
I dream of the spirit of my mother, long buried,
rising in recognition and impossible reunion.
I dream of chasing my brothers, gathering
and keeping them safe, whole and alive.
I dream of climbing to Grandma's roof
to get a closer look at God.
I dream of us, blessed and brave.
I dream of us, festive and free.
I dream and dare
expect.
|
||||
4. |
||||
I don't know what I'm doing
I just play
I play chords like a church song
That scale I was raised on
And the memories hurt some
I can't shake it it's in me still
All of the pride and shame instilled
Accents, I was raised to feel
True meaning when our words just fail
I know we are scarred and the love is real
My Amharic's not what it used to be
Get excited when a few words come to me
It's like playing these black keys
I can't call the notes, but it's therapy
We long to connect I guess, even when home is a wreck
And stretched across continents, we left and left
I'm always leaving, but dreaming to stay
All of these relics and keepsakes
Adorn our necks like lost faith
Of crosses that we don't pray to
Just to celebrate what made you
Cry out loud, let the rain heal
For a home that isn't so pain-filled
What we can't see but we may build
Dreams get made like they're make-believe
Make-believe
And I may conceive a world in my mind that I may achieve
I may achieve
What I reach up for as I'm falling down
Down, falling down
Though my closest friends, they are still around
Around my way it's the same, I guess
Homeless hunting for cigarettes
Kids on the court trying to see who's best
Arms raised up, we don't know who's next
We don't know who's next
Please help us live
And if you choose to give a damn
I will show you who I am
Just to show you who I am
So these days I get up early
Stroll from Yonge to Berkeley
Hold my chest from the biting cold
Every moment it writes our souls
And we don't know the path
But it's our path to stray
I might go, I have to say
Just how much a laugh can say
A laugh can say
|
||||
5. |
||||
We are live in the belly of the beast
A two-headed monster
I'm a child of the East
Africa, my family were all refugees
Scattered round the planet over continent and seas
Some of us landed in land that just wasn't free
Found contradiction where we tried to find peace
Real ground friction, that'll make you find a piece
It sounded so different, they were selling us a dream
Some of us were force-conscripted into beef
To become the face of another person's grief
Some of us in homes to which others hold keys
We're not treated equally
We are not here peacefully
We repeat everything
That is unhealed here
Victims are us and we victimize others
At the same time
With the same line they used on us
Occupied Palestine
Where the soldiers show up and they look like us
All of us got our own blood-stained hands for something
While the same state would just kill us for nothing
Here on stolen land there can never be justice
Like a rock in a slingshot
The last hope when your options are all gone
Against an army and a twenty-foot wall
Under all these apartheid laws
My cousin's a different kind a second-class citizen
The worst kind of warden in this prison
He'd be locked up if he isn't
Their enemies are not different
Life in the belly of the beast
A two-headed state, way they operate and think
We are separated now by continent and sea
And over here they talk about "the land of free speech"
Until you critique Zionism or police
You can boycott something based on your beliefs
But if you're talking Israel, then they got beef
They even passed laws against organizing meets
That mention BDS, just depending where you be
We pay all these taxes to build a war machine
That takes Palestinian land and ways of being
I know it's depressing
They say it's a different oppression
But a story is the most potent form of a weapon
They create fear to keep us all in suspension
While they made the whole world's biggest open air prisons
Listen, this isn't religion
This is just capitalism
And if our oppression's connected
Then our freedom is too, so let's get it
Like a rock in a slingshot
The last hope when your options are all gone
Against an army and a twenty-foot wall
Under all these apartheid laws
My cousin's a different kind of second-class citizen
The worst kind of warden in this prison
He'd be locked up if he isn't
Their enemies are not different
If we want to get free, then Palestine must be
If we want to get free, then Palestine must be
If we want to get free, then Palestine must be
If we want to get free, then Palestine must be
|
||||
6. |
||||
My heart is a world.
In it Tigray is free.
The land neither besieged
nor looted. The air clear
of strikes and slaughter.
Our bodies no longer
battlefields. Our love
the only thing
burning.
|
||||
7. |
||||
Black love
I don't gotta explain too much
My folks got my back like no one does
Something bout loving you in our native tongue
Opens up possibilities and heals where I'm from
I love the way my name feels in your mouth
I hope I hold yours as delicate and proud
I wonder if the ancestors smile when they see us
Something bout your happiness feels like freedom
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
I sang about the quest on the first take
Projected where I'd find love in a new way
Landed on the motherland in February
Still shaky from the jump
But my soul was good to undertake what was to come
New era and a new day
Clean slate to start again with my family
18 years separated, no more shadowboxing
Holding on to thoughts that weren't mine
Time to get real with the storyline
A vision of my father in the eyes of all his brothers
Laughing at the kitchen table, teasing one another
The aunties making sure that everything's in order
Chilling in the living room, chatting up for hours
Needed some connection that I didn't know I needed
Needed a reflection of myself that's deeply seated
Needed to find what I was told was long gone
The future is bleak when you don't know where you're from
Now moving forward
Open-hearted conversations
Healing in so many spaces
Breaking down and picking up the pieces
Bunna sipping, practicing tradition
Quietly observing, catching up and navigating
All that's in between worlds
My head high, the more I discover
What it means to be a member of the team
Realizing that everybody had lost
Mending what I thought and what it was
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
There was nothing like the first time that I touched home
Saw every side of life right there on Bole Road
Got to rock a show with Mulatu in the front row
And then shared bunna every morning for the next week
Connections were deep
My Amharic, weak
But I wasn't afraid to speak
Saw friends become family
I didn't want to leave
I still can't believe it
But one by one, my close ones started leaving
I started seeing pictures of a different Addis
And didn't recognize any of the places I've been
I started making this album to remember
In January 2020, but that November
A war popped off
Now I feel dismembered
I got good friends with family members missing
I got some friends that act like nothing's different
And some wave flags like they celebrate the militants
I just mourn my idea of home
And this, too, is a pain that our parents have known
How they all got through it, y'all, I just don't know
But I don't think any of us can do it alone
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
For us
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
Black love is always, always there for you
For us, for us
|
||||
8. |
||||
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
From the ashes of our homes
The passion in our bones
This madness we have known
All goes to catacombs
All we hold is memory
All we are is centuries of energy that molded everything
From thoughts and prayers
To places we have settled
We created, then we jetted
Don't know where we are headed
Still tryna stay connected
I’m a refugees son, that had to learn how to run
Who struggled to express it with a colonizers tongue
I once made peace with the place that we come from
Before the war drums beat again
My people move their feet again
We’ve only known what freedom is in moments of this life
Moments we hold precious, so much they become our guides
I’m finding my way out of the darkness again
This trauma and pain lives in our body and brain
And we can’t work through what we can’t even explain
There’s ways that we can grow
But we may never be the same
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
Lord knows I grieve well
Well, well
Pull my car over, let loss feed me my medicine
I always mean well
Well, well
But feeling trapped when I trap ghosts inside my head again
We had extra passion but compassion was on Dexatrim
Who I was with her will never get my breath again
Who I have become is who I’ve been invested in
Invest in him, he tryna give my best
See me as I really am, and not as you expect
But I must do the same
And I been looking at our movement through a fugue of pain
Torn between where I am wanted and I’m needed since they’re not the same
I hope I’m not insane
I just wanna love him
I just wanna love you
Wanna love them
For you to feel me
When we not touching
Only rap was easy
Everything else took some struggling
And I’m not running
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
And this is the hardest part
Finding our way through the dark
Your love is the spark
Let's go from the start
|
||||
9. |
||||
Octavia taught us
To be a phoenix we must
First burn
I first learned
How growth hurts
How love works
Through heartbreak
And time it takes
To heal
Faith to know that it will
And when it does
We love deeper than the pain we feel
My wings revealed in fire I had to walk through
And all the trauma from the burns I had to talk through
It took a lot of us to process all the losses
We are still on it trying to assess all the causes
A fire that’s raging since before we came of conscious
Or even took a breath at all
We’re living through them Parables
Sowing Talents for a cause
How do we imagine what comes after all our buildings fall?
And walk together for a vision in our art
Here we listen heart to heart
Spark matches in the dark
Illuminate these pathways that we made that’s off the charts
Fire takes
Fire gives
Fire always plays a part
There's some kinds of life that's only made out of fire
We're a nomadic tribe made of lovers and of fighters
A phoenix wings first must burn before it flies up
Assata taught me, Octavia taught us
There's some kinds of life that's only made out of fire
We're a nomadic tribe made of lovers and of fighters
A phoenix wings first must burn before it flies up
Assata taught me, Octavia taught us
Assata taught me
It's our duty to fight
It's our duty to win
Don't let them steal your light
The flame within
Your power, your passion
The fire to burn oppression
To make it through the drought
And the man-made recession
Stop giving concessions
Your spirit is real
Collective a spark
The fire to heal
The deeper we feel
The greater the zeal
The less we conceal
The more we reveal
The freer we feel
Now that's a real deal
I want to live life
Life beyond the fight
I want to live right
Life that honors light
Brought me through night
See how the sun shines
Never denies
Beauty that lies deep in her eyes
Rise in the sky
With rhythm and rhyme
We'll set the world right
It's beauty from ash
Candles we light
Vigils at night
The darkness it swells
And threatens demise
The people must rise
The phoenix inspires
The fire this time
There's some kinds of life that's only made out of fire
We're a nomadic tribe made of lovers and of fighters
A phoenix wings first must burn before it flies up
Assata taught me, Octavia taught us
There's some kinds of life that's only made out of fire
We're a nomadic tribe made of lovers and of fighters
A phoenix wings first must burn before it flies up
Assata taught me, Octavia taught us
|
||||
10. |
||||
"There have been tears of sadness
But let's balance it with all the joy
Are you crying for real? Stop it"
Ceremonial drives, I’m a miss em
Most albums, you got the first listen
This one is different
Funerals are for the living
I want them to know your heart
I want them to know all the different parts
Of our worlds that shouldn’t get along but did
And all the sacrifices you made for the Hid
All the sacrifices you made and hid
For your loved ones to grow and have a safe place to live
In the ways that we wish we did
All of the grace you’d give
Side-eyed and smirking with
An open mind at the same time, surprises
Characters, voices, comedic timing
I remember we all shared one ride then
For years, you redefined what home meant
To see and be seen, in wholeness
We are lucky if we feel that in moments
Some went so far through them doors you opened
I’m just thankful you knew you were loved
On the day you left us
I’m thankful you knew you were loved
On the day you left us
Ceremonial drives, I’m a miss em
Most albums, you got the first listen
This one is different
Funerals are for the living
"That's essentially what it is, right?
We love each other, and we help each other
And are there for each other through good times and bad
Whether we ask for it or not, you know what I'm saying?
We always have this wonderful family
And these wonderful people that have our backs, regardless
Thank you for having my back
And my sister's back
And this restaurant's back
And Hidmo's back
And Hidmo's back, oh shit, oh shit"
We'll just keep on living
We'll keep pushing on
Grateful for your love
Grateful for your love
We'll keep on living
We'll just keep on living
We'll just keep on living
Grateful for your love
I'm so grateful for your love
So grateful for your love
I'm so grateful for your love
So grateful for your love
So grateful
Many hours
All the conversation
You saved my life
I'm grateful
I'm so grateful
Hope I make you proud
I'm grateful
Hope I make you proud
I'm grateful
"Hey what's up Jenny, it's Gab hitting you up
I got your text, and I was gonna text you back but I was like, ahh let me hit you up
I hope you are doing well
And keeping your mind strong and creative
And full of positivity in this time
And yeah, hit me up when you get a chance
Peace"
I am so grateful
I am so grateful
I will keep on living
I will carry on
I will carry your love
Forever
And ever
And ever
I miss you so much
|
||||
11. |
Spacetime
02:59
|
|||
I don't know if home is in a place or in a time
Or in a combination that lives somewhere in our mind
Maybe we don't know it until we leave it behind
Or maybe it's a moment, the moments that always shine
I walk through my city like an old ghost
Whole neighborhoods and memories I hold close
They've been erased, buffed, repaved, and bulldozed
But I carry in me everything that made it before
Still standing like the hope that comes after a war
Traumatized like, what was all that fighting for?
We lost lives, I didn't have time to mourn
I didn't know that these moments they would be so short
My home is with the people I've been writing this for
Without a place on the map to say it's ours anymore
From rented homes to suburban tombstones I roam
It's just echoes of my folks in the stories that's shown
I know the essence and the soul that they trying to clone
For every neighborhood block that we see get sold
These moments that made it, that we hold so sacred
Have always been about the people more than the places
I don't know if home is in a place or in a time
Or in a combination that lives somewhere in our mind
Maybe we don't know it until we leave it behind
Or maybe it's a moment, the moments that always shine
I don't know if home is in a place or in a time
Or in a combination that lives somewhere in our mind
Maybe we don't know it until we leave it behind
Or maybe it's a moment, the moments that always shine
My city is new, so I try to be too
Comb through the avenues like a tourist would do
It's still hard on my heart, I'm trying to soften some parts
Smile when I cross a familiar face at the park
I think life is in moments, we only get so few
I can’t carry your weight, and still be able to move
So who am I to tell you you should share in my blues?
You never took a single day to try to walk in my shoes
And if you did it would break you, so just stay thankful
This is for the people that can claim what I've been through
I slept on a bus, when I couldn't make rent due
And came home to plates of injera and lentils
I was never alone, that was all in my mental
Lies that my pride said, I try to stay gentle
With me, and with you, all I know that is true
The best things in life always end too soon
I don't know if home is in a place or in a time
Or in a combination that lives somewhere in our mind
Maybe we don't know it until we leave it behind
Or maybe it's a moment, the moments that always shine
I don't know if home is in a place or in a time
Or in a combination that lives somewhere in our mind
Maybe we don't know it until we leave it behind
Or maybe it's a moment, the moments that always shine
|
||||
12. |
Some Family
02:51
|
|||
It's not an easy song to write
But the story wouldn't be complete without this one
Some of the fires that shape our lives
They're not the loud and explosive kind
Sometimes it's a slow burn
When friendships fall apart, it's a rip in the heart
It's worse than a breakup depending how far
Histories involved, this album and all
I got some new info, I had to make a call
You didn't want to talk about it at all
Now I remind you of the truth that you run from
You know I know what you won't admit to no one
I wasn't judging, just wanted a discussion
Thought you were a close one, but you stay running
I guess some folks would just rather talk about nothing
Have fun on your own then, I hope you heal some
For you and the family that you don't want to see
I don't know why I thought you would be better to me
I guess 20 years wasn't what I thought it would be
Maybe some trauma goes so deep you can't see
My doors been open but I know you won't reach
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
The past can't dictate how we move
But if we don't learn from it, watch what we do
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
We all lose loved one way too soon
What's worse, when some choose to lose you
Big homie, I patterned my life some
In ways that I learned from you as young one
I remember you showed love when nobody was then
There's doors that have opened cuz of songs that we made when
We struggled to pay rent, man back in the days it
Always meant something to connect
I made sure to represent
The whole crew in interviews, albums and events
But the whole truth isn't something that I knew yet
When it came to real spit, you would run so quick
And you don't owe it to me, but this is not a friendship
You told the world we were family, but this isn't it
I got no response to the olive branches I sent
I'm in mourning, tryna find the lesson in this
But sometimes heartbreak is just what it is
Our friendship may no longer exist
But I hope you heal, and connect with your kid
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
The past can't dictate how we move
But if we don't learn from it, watch what we do
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
We all lose loved one way too soon
What's worse, when some choose to lose you
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
We all lose loved one way too soon
What's worse, when some choose to lose you
Some family you are born into
Some family is who you choose
The past can't dictate how we move
But if we don't learn from it, then we all gon lose
|
||||
13. |
||||
This is what comes after
In more ways than one
After the fire and the ashes were gone
It took time to build desire up to write a new song
So much destruction, so much went wrong
These objects we all thought were sacred are gone
Love is the foundation we've been building upon
And with that still solid, we are carrying on
This is new growth after all our old things burned
Like a ceremony, but we were forced to learn
The way forests thrive with the small fires
Gotta clear space for some things to grow higher
And if we don't, this consumes us all
I'm in the city now, watching all these ashes fall
Thinking 'bout what grows when the time comes
'Cause the climate got a whole human crisis
Capitalism has got us sick, we gotta fight it
Until the day that we can all stand united, after the fire
After the fire took away our place
After the flames burned all our thangs
After the ashes fell like the rain
After the pain we grew in a new way
After the fire took away our place
After the flames burned all our thangs
After the ashes fell like the rain
After the pain we grew in a new way
After the fire stopped blazing from the bombing of our island
I wonder if my Nana started smiling
Did she feel liberated by the end of Japanese violence?
Or feel conflicted by the invasion of American tyrants?
It's amazing how a flame can be used to abuse
Or be worked with lovingly to help forests renew
And if only we knew what our ancestors would do
As the empire falls, look to the past for the truth
Innovate new tools, infusing prayer and intuition
The poetics of the elements, revealing premonitions
Time moves in cycles
The land is insightful
New growth thrives right after a typhoon
There's wildfires in my birth land
And rising tides in my homeland
They say it's only getting worse
And we plant new seeds every time we touch a mic and notepad
After the fire was treated like a relative
After the flame was seen like a medicine
After the ash was applied to our face
After the pain we found a new strength
After the fire was treated like a relative
After the flame was seen like a medicine
After the ash was applied to our face
After the pain we found a new strength
It's like we lifting up the hood
I ain't no mechanic but the little engine could
Holding on some gasoline and rolling up the wood
Shango in the trees like, homie wish you would
Leaning on Orishas so I put it in m'Oshun
Sent us back to hell, but they said it was no room
Hero to a villain, guess we living in Dune
I ain't really in the mood
I be staring at the moon
We the only people who ain't even got a name
But the whole world eating off of African pain
You can peep the averages
Reading Middle Passages
Word to Pocahontas' Daddy
They called us some savages too
But see me I know the truth
So even when I say I'm Black
That mean Indigenous roots
From Seattle to Mogadishu
Don't try to make an issue
Naw I ain't the mayor
But they know that we been official
How we travel waters but they saying we can't swim?
Why my cuddy gotta take a plea when the case slim?
Even when we hot, we can lie, can't win
Wanna be free but the city is caged in
Real life
After the fire, I ain't had no friends left
After the flame, I was lost on impact
After the break, had to let that past go
After the pain, knew it wouldn't last though
After the Nu Growth, there was an NRG
After the first SOW, there was a trilogy
The fire next time gon' come for the industry
When it all fades, all we got is the memories
We rose from the ashes of our history
When the darkness comes to light
But despite this fight, the future is bright
We gon' be alright
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14. |
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We made it out the fire together
Been all around the world and said vows together
My today, my tomorrow, and forever
We lost things but it’s you I treasure
We built up a whole new home that’s better
Than the one we fled from
We’ve been tested by so much
But at the end of it all home is your touch
To my best friend I still crush on
Who I laugh everyday with, five years strong
Loving you is so easy, when the world goes wrong
We still find a way to live a beautiful song
With no drama at all, just a place of calm
And sweetness that has stayed a balm
Plus all the real talk they’d expect from us
The best part of my last five years is us
I mean every single moment that we shared my love
My love, my love, my love, my love
You and me
We made it out the fire together
Our love, our love, our love
So serene
Let's be the love song that we want to hear
It’s a magic that’s hard to capture
Your pen gets closer, let’s write these chapters
We might learn French and move out to Paris
Build a whole new home that we learn to cherish
I never knew our 40’s would be so live
I’m excited to see all the ways that we might thrive
What happens when the books are what you really want to write?
Plus those unknown crafts that I know you’re gonna try
You inspire me to listen to the voice inside
And don’t just settle for what happens in life
We gon work through any of our strife
Like we have love, every single time
I want to love and keep growing with you
Want to keep a home where kids will want to visit us too
So let’s be the Black love song that we want to hear
Until we’re old and we’re gray and the day that we’re out of here
My love, my love, my love
You and me
You and me
Our love, our love, our love
So serene
So serene
You know, love is that space to recoup and rejuvenate
And have peace and calm even in really tough times
And everything that we've been through these last few years
That has deepened the safety that we've built around each other
And the comfort and the calm that we've built around each other
Our relationship has gotten easier
As the world around us has gotten harder
Because we have dedicated more time and energy into building that for each other
And it really makes me feel like we can survive anything
And that we can find joy in any time
And it's such a beautiful and simplistic view of love that I never thought was possible
It's elegant in its simplicity
And it makes you feel almost invincible
Yeah
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15. |
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My body is the vessel
Stressed beyond it’s threshold
All we had to care for when we fled our burning temples
I’ve been hard on mine
I’m tryna teach my mind how to be gentle
I got scars that shine
Weight I carry could make me resentful
But this weight I carry carried all my hopes and held my mental
This weight I carry carried me in love and I am thankful
This weight I got married in is worth cherishing
We age different
Made it through apocalyptic scenes
Live to honor all of our lost friends and family
It isn’t easy, but there’s a beauty in surviving this
I see the reason every time I see our kids
And it’s an act of trust to love ourselves the way they love us
The way we love them, we can not lose touch
To build a safe place for them, we need a safe place for us
It’s a home that’s more than home, more than close ones you know
A safe place to grow
Heal our hearts and ease our souls
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
The child in me
Still feels it all
We ran from bombs and fires and guns
From a dream we could not touch
Now I'm grown
With babies of my own
I heal myself so I become
A home to the ones we love
From the ashes of our homes
Battles long, will it ever pass?
For safety for our own, must reborn
I heard Phoenix laugh
Felt it in my bones
Flesh gets old while my fingers grasp
A feather made of embers
In your winter, remember it can’t last
That is if you grow
We escaped from places made our own
And now my tongue is native to a language safe has never known
I treasure those
Who strain to make those feathers glow
But what I’m severed from makes me afraid to feel we’re ever close
Forever closed
The numb felt like the love the world would never show
And in my numb became the gun that pieces homes
Or keeps from whole
By putting holes in peace we prayed
Preyed by beasts with fangs
Who make you beast who scream in pain
And thus we burn the homes we used to dream to make
I dream to take that fire and make a thing of grace
To ease the pain our parents couldn't even name
To increase our gains
We need the weight
Don't need to wait
To keep our home from the ashes
We must be the safe
I earn/urn my ashes by the things I face
From the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
A safe place for us, from the ashes of our homes
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