Asterisk Underscore... Asterisk Underscore... I'm simply High rollin I bust like a car quickie I'm sickly. Givin' the real On a tip-slipping Burial theory. To me I guess it was just My insecurity; I learned it real early; Watch as my memories burnin. As I enter my three-in-the-morning World still turning; Threat of a gun instilled Among my people killed; Wounded with no solutions And cut down at will. Still still Nigga Still still. We must proceed Mem'ry in mind and a cap peeled; Lookin forward to finding, Tryna find our own chill. When my life felt apart to jazz; I rebuilt it by putting it in my craft. They said everything was fair in love and war Till I dated nam...

Yeah yeah... ah yeah... indeed. Lil Kydd. sulu. let's do this... I'm an artist. I cough up sharpies, pencils, copics and blicks Blocking all the paths of access into the River Styx Collecting liquids to mix into an automated clip Then superimpose some MIDI and sell for about a quid Spitting. rhymes at a Kwanzaa party "Habari Gani" goes the crowd I respond with "Imani" That's Swahili for faith the likes of which are tested Lest I finish my set and I lay my sights upon this young lady she peeped me for a minute sayin Follow me upstairs baby... I've been lonely for a minute lately. I oblige... Then the littlest twinkle of curiosity In her oculuar Follows me all between the rifts Over the audio clips Slipping into the cracks and crevices in my mental Up the stairs, into the bedroom My bed got no leg room. She could make me walk a country mile in a New York minute Her beauty infinite For her I spit it Cadenzas, sonnets, and limericks (No gimmicks) Been a sucker for love ever (since I was invented) But I (feel like spending my nights alone) I need to (Give you a little more space to grow) And if (I don't wanna be around anymore) Then I... I... (I'm through, giving up... I) But I (feel like spending my nights alone) I need to (Give you a little more space to grow) And if (I don't wanna be around anymore) Then I... I... (I'm through, giving up got to go...) We're not sexing. Though intercourse is intellectual Not yet spiritual But she could turn me into a specter Use minutes of my here and now to check in on her now and again she sweeter than now and laters So I hate to Give her up but I have to Got a backpack and a Dream Still an underground But I can't get nabbed up Not now The affairs of the heart got me feelin kinda down And I can't trust you. But I love you But love ain't nothing but a Word or a sin With a verb and a pen I shy away From another bae for another day Gone in the wind Yup, gone yet again There are better things To burden yourself in Than the scars And reminders Don't get blinded To the point that you're sayin that you'll never love again I can't love you now But I'll love you later It's up to you if you wanna wait But Until the day Im'ma chase the paper Until the day Im'ma chase the paper But I hate to...

I'm a walking cog optimistic off the blistered wrist of women Cognizant of positive Acknowledgin the pro-b-lems The opposite of tolerant I'm Bothered when you Try to say I'm whinin but I'm not within the Jurisdiction judgin just a misconception Maybe (maybe) Who knows, perhaps I'm crazy, but... ...It appears the scars and gashes in my noggin With the artfulness has been transformed to dirt upon my moccasins As if the damage on my psyche isn't much but then I track it all around me dirt upon my carpet yeah we walked in sin And I emerge a newer man shrouded in the darkness... Dim lights, no sound Then suddenly the street light hits me I been here for a long time ...Here for a long, long time Been slave to the grind as usual But if the crew sees me If any one of you see me Wanna ask how I be Sure enough I stand on my own two feet Everything's peachy~ Sharp eyes couldn't be more keen I be Sitting in the middle of the road With the cloud overhead And the moon and the stars don't gleam What's loneliness? (Whaaaaat?) What's solitude? (Whaaaaat?) But a check and a pen And a dream and a scheme and a wallet full of air and a prayer and a sack full of decent intentions? Pursuing the gold No heart no soul in a stone cold case Like I'm C-3 I be ridin the highway to hell And all of my other niggas steady fighting for the free seat No flex But the wizard is said to deliver the bread like I'm Kiki Palmer... y'know I gotta spell it out For the kids and the cats in the back seats Mind bend and the gentleman Putting two gangstas next to each other say GG Been workin myself to the marrow Lean in fatigue Inner peace what I'm seeking And I ain't finna get it When I'm chasin companions A chance in the pants see You ain't my type My mind's in between two alt keys y'Backslash Better back up off me Lil mama givin me lip But you ain't finna gloss me stuck up in the crack so you can't even floss me Your gaze would paralyze me till I ain't talkin But the mind still work That's Stephen Hawking We rolling Two wheelin, back heeling No I didn't mean to hurt your feelings Due to the lack of sleep and leaf I'm peelin Back the layers of my conscience Nigga revealing The pain of another lover Gonna tint my vision (x4)

(poetry by Naudia Williams) They fade in and out of memories to forget the blood shed of this week. They celebrate with broken spirits and hallow solo cups Enchanted by the witch of the city who whisk winds into her throat Their feet work almost as fast as God But they haven't spoken to him in so long They drink until Lake Erie runs dry They bop until the cops come shooting Or which ever comes first They dive into the juke of the music Forgetting the alleyways they go home to They juke, they work, they bob And weave out of traffic Their souls lean into syrup to be digested by yesterday's regrets They're here to break backs and bread with a community of fatherless children

What rotten cotton picking luck the Pigs done broken Into my Car Searching for Ducks Yuck And if they find the roach I'm going smokeless What's the worth of looking a hipster for a cop not your opponent? You don't wanna mess with the hash slinging slasher Turned ash flicking rapper Flip your cap back like Ash Ketchum. Make like an ashtray and pass seconds I've been setting fire to Auburn logs of Autumn since I passed Gresham Driving by your corner with a buckwheat finger wag Cuff linked grip attached to Green filled dinner bag Silver on the sidewalk Red kool aid on the pavement Don't avoid your payments Either pay up or Payless People understand the struggle more when you party less Eyes caught em slipping like your tee-tee in a party dress Bad form Merlin couldn't handle none of Artie's mess Hit me on my side-brick-pager Black in, black out call it a Darth Vader They can drop you off at the corner around the way up The moon is still afloat in the distance My nigha, stay up five at the door we charge the women at two Speakers inside of the function bumpin outside on the stoop Now if the cops break us up then There ain't a thing we can do. But if the neighbors call our parents then we stashing the loot. Shouts to the plug for the evening He came from south of the loop Let's split the wad into cabbage Let's split the cabbage in groups We came around here on that perfect cell Don't come back on majin buu Call it Cell Jr for reasons Cause the Blue won't swallow you So I'm told... enough with the transit talkin We're fitting the mass of three classes inside this man's apartment. We ain't talkin taebo And we ain't talkin Kindergarten There are three bedrooms that are prime for the smashing Thumbs up. We paid for the setup It's time to get cracking Like the blackest of baguettes baked with some drugs and molasses I know you got em with looks And I got em with bars They find me mysterious It's they who play me the part Your chest doesn't just make Eye contact hard Riding so crazy that I'm goin off the handlebars airs on my body got a nigga lookin Avatar ...

*scat Aster Under Sugar-spice Rum and coke Love and hate Day and NyQuil Coffee-cream Homewood-Flossmoor Wicked 'Nam Weed in bibles Caps in black folk CAPS and black folk Alcoholic Thought he might go Brother was Father was Father was Break the cycle Breaking bikes and snapping tires Dragging axles On the back of a wanted flyer City want me Box want me Moving keys McCoy Tyner Hell's Kitchen Tom's diner One ear open Slow drivin See the lack written all over the cat like a bad grade Giving the signal People wildin 2000 Hazel Crest Buncha lames Still be dem vets Vets to dogs And domestic pets Lost run it Water wet 304s In 708 312 3.7 GPA CTA Evening Pace Night sessions I-I-I-I I'll go Coleman if you test me short like Gary fly like Bessie More sick than hospital smell When I'm all up in your grill Lookin fried as hell... (Ummmm) Sipping the chai tea On the kick (What) equivalent of the lean and the brick I'm a troll hidin under the bridge with a stick and I'm makin a nigga crease like I'm Chris That's shout to Crack Smart shoppers Teavana done hurt my posture Sippin leaf Smokin leaf Steaming leaf Packing pasta Don't know where's your hands have been Then you can't lay no Digits on us I'm with them trees Wish a nigga wood And it's still a wonder That a 'nig ain't pop'lar (I wonder if they got that.) Like, why? See all this work I been puttin in, sir? (They don't see it.) I don't even care tho, I ain't trippin *harmonize

Merch... Merch... (Eugh...) Watch this anomaly trek the Earth Practicing crackhead economics The phonics in nothing but King's English The pig Latin hadn't had me distinguished from John. and it's hard to be holding gold When your country elects a leprechaun Merch (Eughhh...) One of these days you'll find us chilling in them rental cars Some get there by pushing twenties, I do extra pullin cards We used to rock the crazy frames and the good woods Now I'm decked in the purple Jazz it up like I'm Shug I've been moving in L's That's Lost in your neighborhood don't know jack about him but you know the lil' boy can spell good That's back when a nigga was getting carded for swishers A wizard been flipping his scripts every single December I'm got my toes spreaded and knees bent for your heaviest hitters A heavenly rhetoric leatherneck got napkins for dinner I'm focused on eatin but Not necessarily getting bigger Who'd you rather to rap when the beat Got back like Brazilian ...That's Dem Franchise Boys Like a snap decision Hit the nae nae on your ashes And destroy a food pavilion I'm ravenous I'm not the happiest camper... (I'm not...) (Stay away from me.) (K-killas can't touch it N-Now they givin me dap.) That's how it goes, you mix some Kydd in your drink This for them moms who wash their kids in the sink Up in the kitchen draw them squiggles on this nigga he stink Them poisonous points in the penmanship poised for attack and never defense Up in the land of them wooden fences They thought my trifling nature was gone We in them divots and alleys beckoning ancestors home While all our neighbors focused on appearances and That's middle finger to any committee member complainin about my mama lawn Knock knock and that nigha gone Not sure just what plane I'm on But it ain't the place that I was born merch... Like money-out-pocket merch. (Dice on the ground, bet.) Shirt on your back merch. (Money ain't down, bet) Like pinkie promise, merch. (Gimme your word and bet) Just being honest, merch. (Look, but don't touch the merch.) Now I ain't certain, merch ...now I ain't certain, merch ...And now my feelings hurt, like ...And they said that the kiddie can't rap (K-killas can't touch it N-Now they givin me dap.)x3

When you're smoking more than you're fapping, then it's a problem (x3) ... A wizard tryna get paid Homies ain't readin scriptures and they tryna get saved Everyone using SoundCloud And they all want them plays They all got their own homies That they see every day Imma be super anti-social when I'm reachin a K The pointed fingers and caps are for all the people that left The McDonald's and Wendy's jobs are for the people that stayed Why I'm too busy to sleep? How can a homie get laid? Ladies want the human connection when the cable is frayed I live in a tiny town that causes ruckus over anything Saw line of niggas rioting to get some Krispy Kreme ... Any man with a gram in his pocket's a fiend Any kid with rebellion inside his heart has a scheme People addicted to drama It makes their lives interesting You tryna better yourself Sounds rather bourgeois to me Don't hate a nigga just the way God put the leaves in my tea ...I done smoked so much weed that the weed can tolerate me Find me in your Metra. Eyes lookin hella slumped Chillin with your girl With the brilliant set of Lady lumps She gon' get the curve of the century like it's Forrest Gump Put that on a stack of holy documents and Shonen Jumps ... Got me missing transfers and bus stops At nighttime in a city that I don't even know about In a place where I could get tried for wearing these dreadlocks In a car full of shivering niggas throwing them 'bows out this wizard less prominent When he standing alone Either Imma be famed and single Or taken and broke and the beauty of it is I could curse her existence every poem And I doubt she would read a single word that I wrote

t's like steel to bricks to white picket fences to sticks to grass to dirt to mud Bud Pockets of civilization Sprinkled and seasoned about the nations Spot the difference and obey it If the hood is wild then what is the wild? Nature (x3) High rollin And bustin a car quickie I'm sickly Givin the real On a tip-slipping Burial theory And I guess it was only My insecurity I learned it real early Watch as the memory burnin As I enter my three in the morning World still turning Threat of a gun instilled Among people killed Wounded with no solution And cut down at will Still still Nigga Still still We're to proceed Mem'ry in mind and a cap peeled Lookin forward to finding, Tryna find our own chill Im'ma need someone to tell me how is a nigha to live (x4) -- When my life felt apart to jazz I rebuilt it by putting it in my craft They said everything was fair in love and war Till I dated Nam Then she broke my heart Leaving my demeanor in scars Hiding my feelings In the middle of written and rhythm and bar I chill in the yard Sunshine creeping into my vision I go blind And I look at the time I'm escaping the nine making it in by nine... I see my brethren's name over the pavement Paper chasing Too many lost to be complacent Maybe lately I've been adjacent to snakes and gators Baiting a predator Better summon a medic The rhetoric is equivalent to Methamphetamine regimen Mixed with a pack of the tea And se-ve-ral doses of Ritalin Skittle and m&m's Like a homosexual slim shady Crack babies Calling my rhythm improper medicine Wesley Snipes, lose the fade half of the melanin Hanging with feminine Chillin playing the fire em-bl-em and I figure I ain't got me a care I could give Imma need someone to tell me how is a nigga to live? (x3) (juke) (Cymbal) -- I used to fear love Then became indifferent The eyes of those I that I called brother had squinted at me Look at the foolish in they feelings We pointing, laughing Mark of the friend or Mark of the beast Walking among em in the darkness then I see People in wide arrays Plain faced None of em friends none of em enemies And then I see em Burying bodies and pouring the memories women and men drowning in Hennessy And then I see em Gather in numbers against one another Communities filled with contempt and negative energy Division among us and yet I'm helping a nigga to eat (x4) I used to chase girls Named after the promised land And young women named after buildings and western capitals But now a grown man I solidified my own two feet Inside of the earth and I claimed it for what my passion is Same I receive of the lord whether I'm bond or free So I love everyone always unconditionally (Asterisk Underscore)