1. Black Like That

When I look at my beautiful Black people full of melanin

I see gods walking in the midst of human beings

And then I get to thinking about the evident

Ingrained power inherited by the Supreme Being

I look up at the sun and then I get to thinking

About the Black Scientists, and I get to seeking

Supreme Knowledge, and I make a three-sixty

Back to God and I research His Divine City

In the sky and I think about the Valley

Of Decision and teach my people happily

About the decision they must make in the valley

And about God’s Kingdom, Everlasting City

And about how they must make a 360

Turn back to the Original Scientists and go seeking

Knowledge from the Son, they must get to thinking

About their ingrained power from the Supreme Being

That should prompt them to look at their beautiful Black skin

Especially when they are gods in the midst of human beings

Roaming this earth with beautiful Black skin of melanin

2. The Voices of my Ancestors

I’m walking down the street when I hear a cry

It’s the voices of my ancestors going by

“Truth Prevails,” says Sojourner Truth

Next I get a call from the telephone booth

“Hello?” I ask. “No struggle no progress,”

I recognize the voice as Frederick Douglass

Harriet Tubman yells out, “You’ll be free or die!”

And I’m thinking to myself, “She ain’t lying,”

“Character is power,” says Booker T.

“Education must teach life,” says W.E.B.

Noble says “Wild animals will roam the streets,”

“Tree without roots” Garvey tells me in a beat

“Unity is more powerful than a bomb,” says Elijah

Nothing better than hearing the voice of the Messiah

“KKK wears black robes,” says Thurgood

Went to the courts from the lily white hoods

“A made up mind stops fear,” says Rosa Parks

Oh what life do these voices spark!

Next is Fannie Lou, who’s “sick and tired of being sick and tired,”

James Baldwin says, “Dead embers don’t start fires,”

From Mandela I learn, “Education is the most powerful weapon,”

“Freedom has never been free,” Medgar Evers steps in

Malcolm X tells me “The ballot or the bullet,”

“Redistribute the pain,” says Dr. King from the pulpit

Maya Angelou says with passion, “Still I rise,”

“We ain’t running no more,” Kwame Ture cries

“As long as they ain’t free, I ain’t free,” Muhammad Ali goes on

And then all the voices converge into the voice of Farrakhan

3. Watering Down The Centuries of Pain

1.

You take me out of Africa

Shackle me in the holds of a ship

Then enslave me in America

2.

I’m on the auction block

You examine my physique

I’m sold because I’m good stock

3.

My children are torn away from me

Husband is raped by the slavemaster

And you force me to my knees

4.

A slave rebellion starts

And to make a fearful population

You tear his parts with a horse and cart

5.

Slavery is over, but next is Jim Crow

Deprived of basic human rights

Forced to be below

6.

Civil Rights Movement is in full swing

Crying for jobs and justice but get nothing

Still looking for freedom to ring

7.

A Black president seems to be a victory

‘Post-racial America’ everyone screams

But my people’s death seems to be contradictory

4. In Our Hearts

Emmett whistled at a White lady and got beat to death

Fast-forward to the future and Trayvon got shot

Went back 3 years and saw Oscar take his last breath

Jordan killed over music, then the traffic stop with Walter Scott

Then I turned around and saw my sister Renisha

Just like Jonathan Ferrell who wrecked his car

Women dying in custody like my sister Ralkina

‘Nother Black man down, took down another star

I looked in the gym and saw my brother Kendrick Johnson

Next thing I know a cop rolled on 12-year-old Tamir Rice

Then Michael Brown killed for being Black in Ferguson

Eric Garner couldn’t breathe and they sucking our life

Freddie Gray abused in Baltimore, our blood soaks the land

Raynette dead in New York, Kindra Chapman Alabama

Looked in a Texas jail and saw my sister Sandra Bland

Police lie but the truth is on the dash camera

Emmett Till, Trayvon Martin, Oscar Grant, fallen kings

Jordan Davis, Walter Scott, my brothers living

Renisha McBride, Jonathan Ferrell, live on

Ralkina Jones, infinity and beyond

Kendrick Johnson and Tamir Rice are here

Mike Brown and Eric Garner did not disappear

Freddie Gray and Raynette Turner are alive

Kindra Chapman and Sandra Bland still thrive

They’re in our hearts forever, trust and believe they won’t die

The fight is not over, because the oppressed still cry

5. Rest in Peace Mike Brown

Rest in Peace Mike Brown,

May God be pleased with Mike Brown

But peace is gone because justice still hasn’t come around

Crooked police killed Mike Brown, which sparked a movement on the ground

Crooked cops roam free. Human heart? No, hellhounds

Wilsons and Zimmermans masquerade while the fallen teen is left to decay

Crooked cops get first aid while families of the slain are left to pray

Beasts in human form flock together, on the mentally dead they dine and buffet

As vultures and eagles they gather with evil, and thus Black people are turned to prey

Beasts of the field that unleash blood flow

Dead in the street 4 hours made his blood soak

Through the pain we said his death wouldn’t be in vain

Through the darkness a movement gave light

He was denied the simple human right

To live, and now we know his horrible plight

And though his death will never be alright

We’re standing up like never before

To prevent another hashtag, no more, no more

Rest in Peace, Mike Brown

May God be pleased with Mike Brown

6. Lost in Translation

King, I know you had a dream, a beautiful dream

But that’s all what has been made of you by mainstream

Because you were, are, will always be more

They want to keep you as a dream, a newly developed spore

But you’re a god who evolved up until death’s door

See the struggle wouldn’t be no struggle without the King

And the grind wouldn’t be no grind without your wedding ring

Didn’t sell out but married the freedom train

And on your last night you told us to redistribute the pain

Economic withdrawal of the White businessman

Told us to stop buying dem red Coca-Cola cans

Told us to bank Black, those the words that got lost

Your last words before you paid with your life, the ultimate cost

Somehow the dream got lost in translation and became a nightmare

You said we integrated into a burning house that haven’t gotten us anywhere

Yeah somehow the dream you dreamt, the beautiful dream

Got lost in translation by the wicked mainstream

Because you’re King, a god, evolved towards the solution

Black pain redistribution followed by Black liberation and revolution

They want to keep you as a dream so we won’t realize

That you’re a revolutionary thinker whose last words could open eyes

Thank you, King, thank you, for working toward Black liberation

And I aim to be the you that got lost in translation

7. True Black History

Black History, where are you?

Hidden Colors, Hidden Figures, history screwed

In school all we learn about is White

And then we get the shortest month to learn about Black life

Our history didn’t start with slaves and abolitionists

It started with true visionists and ambitionists

But Black History, where are you?

With this whitewashed history, I’m so through

African kings and queens left in the past

Don’t even know our real names, never even asked

How did the language turn from God to dog

Cause Black History is hiding in the backlog

Black Man, Original Man, the cream rising to the top of the glass

Revolutionary thinkers no man can bypass

But Black History, where are you?

Lord, if only our Black children knew

Einstein and Newton but who created math?

They trace it back to Greeks but Egyptians started that path

What about the sphinx, head of a Black man?

Body of a lion cause he’s the king of the planet man

What about the Olmec heads? Aboriginal civilizations

That was in existence before the White man was in creation

But can’t drink from ancient knowledge cause slavery disconnected us from the straw

And Black History has been hidden by the wicked Satan’s claw

But with Hidden Colors, Hidden Figures, still we rise

And true Black History will cause us to revolutionize

Remember Black people you’re Black History in the making

And know when you awake in March that Black History is everyday