I tie the laces to my shoes the same as any afternoon

And set foot between the walls and your halls and deserted rooms
What’s up kids, I’m here to speak at your alternative school
Seems your luck don’ got you stuck in academic servitude
With less than words to use or choose, a lot more than nerves to lose
It’s cool to turn pissed when your teacher’s a stern prick
Skip class and hit more pipes than Bob Burnquist
Taught ya to accept the phrase that life isn’t a game
While the future warden’s blueprintin’ prisons in your name

He’s in the high school next door top’n the test scores
With nothin’ to stress for except the gas in daddy’s Escort
Born on third base and coulda swore he hit a triple
Workin’ with a full drumkit, while all ya got is a cymbal
Oh, you’d love to take it to’em for all that you been through
Between a rock and a principal’s office- Los in limbo
Tell me, was it your childhood dream to put on a mask
And give a lap or a tap dance for somebody else’s cash

Makes you wanna cut until you hit a vein
Makes you wanna stand up for the words sittin’ in your brain
But you can’t take the master’s house with tools from the master’s toolshed
You’ll have to paint without your whites, blues, or reds
Until the day you drop out or graduate
Enjoy the free sandwich out the b-b-b-b-b-b-bag
I don’t wanna see another genius defeated
‘Cos someboday taught’em lies as a f-f-f-f-f-f-fact

Life’s a freestyle, go on and make it up
Skateboardin’, smokin’ and breakin’ stuff
Skateboardin’, smokin’ and breakin stuff
Fresh out of 38th st. with love
-
CHORUS
If the day’s a wage
And life is war
Then
What are you alive for

Now, ‘cos I stay where I’m from
Don’t mean that I ain’t gon’ come up
‘Cos I grow where I’m from
Planted where I stand- planted where I stand
-
If you’re from where I’m from then give it up
Where either your dad’s a drunk or your dad doesn’t give a-
Maybe he’s both like mine, only good for puttin’ forth
And great example of a father that I’d never like to be
Family’s turn to jail cells and even pickin’ locks can’t help
Nobody’s listenin’, so you have to fight to speak
Light a fire to make’em see, runaway to prove a point
Grab a blunt, a spray can and a black to steal some joy

We feel destroyed for nothin’ in a battle of decoys
In a lost culture, forgotten B-girls gave birth to B-boys
We leave a void in the presence of authority
The history they don’t teach is their way of avoidin’ it
Now, as the schoolhouse rocks steady with hegemony
It makes you wonder if unemployment has a pre-destiny

You rest your eyes upon anywhere else
And set your heart on everything outside yourself
Detention-daydreamin’ of pieces fittin’ the frame
Urban romances, slow dancin’, kissin’ in the rain
Lovely livin’ the day without riskin’ a thing
For someone to look you in the eye and listen to what you say
But you’re lost and forgot who you’re explainin’ yourself to
Alternative to what? And alternative to who?

(Yes, you’re now listenin’ to the undermined, blue collar, workin’-class sounds of The Blend. Ladies and gentlemen, b-boys and b-girls please unlearn while you can.)

CHORUS

Get free or get a degree
Or get both and hope to God you don’t end up like me

A twenty-somethin, good for nothin’, gum bumpin’, bar jumpin’
Non-student-loan-payment-makin’, coffeeshop-slumpin
Broken-home representative in the land of Longfellow
Survivalist or not? That depends on what you call ghetto
Workin’-class, blue collar, failure amongst scholars
Urban program, suspended, left behind condemned to follow
Had ya tracked since smokin’ packs at recess
Called up the summer school and they save your seat and desk

Now, if ya got it then get into it
They’d rather see ya high-strung out on depressants and stimulants
Than addicted and hooked-on Malcolm and Marx
It starts with a shout in the dark- they wonder why we yell
When they don’t listen, we stop listenin’ to ourselves
Wanderin’ hallways and monotonous class schedules
Left to speak through silence and reverse psychology
It’s like these teachers are getting’ hired and paid and praised to fuck with me

There’s no luckily, there’s no duck and weave
Advisors advise ya to chillax and just breathe
To kill your questions, to erase your anger
To unboil your heart, to sanitize your language
Upon these moments, do not dare be hesitant
For the beast will leave you in the realms of irrelevant
Ranked by class grades when already eminent
So all the school can do for you is insult your intelligence

College students hold discussion groups of what you’re goin’ through
But never wanna hold a discussion about their own shoes
Letter to the editor, professor and principal
Don’t fuck with a mind state that you haven’t been to
Don’t fuck with a culture that you don’t live through
Taking authority from a situation you don’t give to
These words and expectations run adjacent
Until you’re educatin’ how the rich stay rich

Dear, Deerview- please check the rearview
And keep an eye on where these snakes try and steer you
Well, it’s been a fine visit on this rhyme clinic
Enjoy your day in RedWing, it’s been a fine visit

And there’s no such thing as kings
It’s just a term invented by men to undermine queens
Have a nice day in class…