Artist: Talib Kweli Album: Radio Silence Song: Knockturnal Typed by: Cedmaster3K [Intro] It's all good, do or die man I hear ya, before I come out and go to work and whatnot I hear a shoot-out and whatnot, what have we (yeah right) You know what, you hear "pop-pop-pop" Listen, and I'm like "Yo!" My moms'd be like, "Yo, you ain't goin' out in that" I said "Look yo, a brother gotta make a livin'" You gotta do what you gotta do [Chorus: Talib Kweli] The vampires make you fear the night That kind of talk give them evil spirits life She on the track like she waitin' for her tears to dry Listen real close, you hear the city cry You hear it right? It's like every night the city die We the blood, we give the city life Livin' the city life [Talib Kweli] The city get restless when the sun go down The words get heated and the guns go {*pow*} I used to joke and smile now everyone's so foul He grab the heat before he leave out the front door now Check the weather, what's the forecast? (forecast) Tryna make it rain, lookin' for more cash (more cash) Little man ain't got no parents, who you gon' follow when your role models send you to the store for a cold bottle? And you come back and see 'em in cuffs, will be enough to hate police, and define manhood as bein' tough Sneakers scuffed and them toes turnt up, this shit is aggravatin' It's hard to put, holes in denim, this ain't a fashion statement Yellin' out, "That's my car", so fascinated by material gain, it's already ours in our imagination The matri-nations of supremacy is masturbation The master race should make you want to mash your face And run right up in somebody gates, like "Where the fuck the safe?" Small, quiet dude in the back, like "I know just the place" He flash a toothy grin the jakes love to hate (love to hate) And then he flashed the gun he had tucked in his waist The conversations son I'm hearin' are overbearin' Ain't no preparin' for how much the hood be oversharin' (word) The night time, always the right time When your blood is what's flowin' through the school-to-prison pipeline [Chorus] [Talib Kweli] Uhh, when you ain't got a pot to piss (yeah) Everybody on the block is your competition Police all in your pocket, you're forced to forfeit When your espionage is corporate, that means you got an office Instead arrested for the petty theft (petty theft) Expected to apologize for every breath A warrior stood in the face of many deaths But since they colonized us, are there any left? He in the streets like he ain't got a home Writin' a poem to the beat of the sobs and moans Ran into Joan, her skin chocolate as a Toblerone Clickety-clack of stilettos on wet cobblestones Streetlights illuminate how truly dark it is The block is a college, she got her degree in marketin' A doctorate in swallowin', this pimpin' paid her scholarships She poppin' out her tits cause they pay her to be provocative Broke niggas tryna holla though (holla though) But they ain't got no dollars though (dollars though) It sound like, "I'ma hit a lick anyday So fuck you bitch, she don't look that good anyway!" (you don't even look that good anyway) Since when is pettiness a virtue? Cops circle the block, they went from stop and frisk to stop and merk you To smokin' dark purple in a crop circle Fast life, this entourage is sayin' "Got terfs?" (it's cold) [Chorus]