[ Featuring Kendrick Lamar ]
They felt that they were laying tracks, for the generation to come
I think my mother knew that freedom wouldn't come in her lifetime
Just like I know it won't come in mine
It's a matter of, either you stay like this or somebody sacrifice
Somebody laying tracks, so we can stay in a 360 degree
Deadly circle, somebody used to break out and risk,
You know losing everything and being poor and getting you down
But someone has to do something, had I had a father, had I had somebody's opportunities
I would be able to have my mother more
I was taught never trust a nigga, far as you can see him
Teach a nigga how to fish, is supposed you try'na feed him
Look a man in the eyes, that's the best way to read him
'Cause faces they change, but point of views remain
I got a strange feeling, that I'm a little bit different
Beyond the customs and tradition is a project living
My Korean warfare, grandfather's affliction
Was stress and I inherited his heart condition
In Vanhart there's an addiction, was heroin needles
Petty hustling, the evils, the street man lust
So I'm mixed with that lethal combination with trust
I've only scratched the surface, what's underneath this verses
The feeling of a young boy lost, without a purpose
Still waters run deep in the street we were submerged in
Police lurking, try'na catch a nigga surfing
He ain't going back to jail, so he bust a verse
This is for my everyday ghetto nigga
It don't really mather where you from niggas
Before you leave the house, kiss your moms nigga
'Cause you don't know when that day had come nigga
'Cause only lord knows that I know how you feel
What we gotta do just to live
We try not to get our cap peeled, try not to get your cap peeled
It's hard to get to know me, let you hear between bars
Taught your soul self contained on my childhood scars
I was involved from a far, affected by the street laws
Concrete walls, not even earthquakes could shake them brick walls
Nick's and garden projects this is me y'all
Dope dealers have it all and then free fall
Caine numbs the pain up and down the ghetto seesaw
The voice of the youth, they hear me and they see y'all
They don't see a diamond in the rough, they see flaws
They just see how we was raised and they would be in awe
Against all it gets hard not to kill niggas
It's like a full-time job not to grab the semi auto
And go kamikaze on somebody who plotting
Probably on my body laying lifeless, ungodly sacrifices
To the streets, this is the trinity
Money matters and murder the hood's DNT
This is for my everyday ghetto nigga
It don't really mather where you from niggas
Before you leave the house, kiss your moms nigga
'Cause you don't know when that day had come nigga
'Cause only lord knows that I know how you feel
What we gotta do just to live
We try not to get our cap peeled, try not to get your cap peele
They say the average man only lives to 25
Well I made it past that and a nigga still alive
Which means I'm in a rare I'm indebted to death
That's the way that, I'm still tracing that steps
Leaving my footprints in the sand, the concrete rose
That grew on infertile land and blossomed to a grown man
My only fear is pops holding moms hand
Dripping tears on my casket, I refuse to let it happen
By any means avoiding the city traffic
Shooters got the green light, they blocking you right of passage
A young kid turn 7 city madness
A picture painted on the street's canvas excuse my brashness
I'm trying to live to see past this
Staring at the world and my rear view past tense
In no particular fashion, I'm on borrowed time I'm on this ground with a passion
This is for my everyday ghetto nigga
It don't really mather where you from niggas
Before you leave the house, kiss your moms nigga
'Cause you don't know when that day had come nigga
'Cause only lord knows that I know how you feel
What we gotta do just to live
We try not to get our cap peeled, try not to get your cap peeled
Generation to generation to come
They won't come in mind
Sacrifices, sacrifices, sacrifices
Deadly circle, deadly circle
