Artist: Brand Nubian
Album:  Time's Runnin' Out
Song:   A Child Is Born (Original Version)
Typed by: OHHLA Webmaster DJ Flash

[Lord Jamar]
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too
Because only God knows what you go through, uh
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too

[Sadat X]
He grew up in an instant, the fourth of seven children
The oldest male, on the block that's half and half
Brown stones to neck bones, crack jones to tones
Where young girls spread out and drop seeds like they farmers
They old as they mommas and the same age as they aunt
and the neighborhood drunk man
and that lady with the dreaded disease, is like hard to please
And the house of ill fate with the metal gate
Keep the thin people cracked out like crunch they munch
The old man with the fruit stand, is on his knee
and his hand, his old heart, just can't stand the CPR
As they load him in the back of a car
I'm on a world tour to help free the poor
From the local drug cats to kids in front of the store
Number runners, gang bangers and the fake money spenders
Reality check rings as we descend from the kings

[Grand Puba]
Now a child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God's smilin on you but he's frownin too
Cause only God knows what you'll go through
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God's smilin on you but he's frownin too
Cause only God knows

[Lord Jamar]
No hope, was scopin horror in my horoscope
Tomorrow I could be broke, this ain't a joke
I'm twenty dollars away, from bein dead ass
I'm 'bout to spend half, on a bag to get my head blast
Last week I lost the Justice Cypher Born
That spawned a rift with my Wis, now she dipped with my kids
I live by the subway, niggaz push drugs in my hallway
All day everyday, tryin to get the pay
And I've been tryin to find a better way
It seems when you poor then you forced to endure to raw play
Survival be your forte, lookin forward to
arrival of your food stamps, projects like boot camps
With generals, cookin chemical warfare
Peace to Amir, I ain't seen your ass in four years
The law bears down on anybody that's brown
My complexion, puts me in the direction of the section 8
Rejection seems to be my fate
As a kid I wanted shit but momma always used to say I had to wait
And its been drama up to date
Enough to traumatize people's lives and the eyes that try to fixate

[Sadat X]
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too
Cause only God knows what you'll go through
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too
Because

[Grand Puba]
Born into existance, with some resistance
A struggle, comin out my ol' Earth's womb
It was little past noon, three months before June
I had a feelin I was headed toward the land of doom
I came out, and the doctor got ready to smack
I grabbed the 'bilical cord, and tried to pull myself back
but it was too late for that, cause out slid the sack
So I guess I gotta maintain where I'm at
Now I'm here breathin this new kind of air
Poverty bound, headin for the welfare
I had a feelin somethin wasn't gonna be right
Cause I can feel it in my mom's uptight appetite
Now I'm growin up around stale beans and drug fiends
and shiesty characters with their harebrained schemes
Now momma I don't wanna be poor no more
And I'm tired of these crackheads in front of our door

[Outro]
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too
Because only God knows what you'll go through
A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smilin on you but he's frownin too
Because only God knows what you'll go through