If I Only Had Words - Dice Raw, Jill Scott

If I was gonna tell somebody

I wanna make it clear that they see

Ain’t no room for hidin'

I want it to be you that would know

Yo, I gotta give a shout out to my mom

Yo, Miss Pam you the bomb

You all that miss lady

Yeah, look at your baby

I’m all grown, representin' my home in a zone

I’m proof that the ghetto has more than crack

Man, I’m a black American dream

And I work off pure, self esteem

Just a lump of coal, pressure and time

Changed to a diamond

Out shinin', out rhymin', out climbin'

And once I hit the mountain, spit like your main squeeze poutin'

Fall like the Vatican can stop me

Point the finger if you want, but I don’t know who you got

I rose to the top, fresh out a bottomless pit

And clawed my way, churned, crawled, balled and spit

And every brother is the same as Dice

Cause we all from the streets, we all have the same lighting

Yo, the hoods bug, it’s time to make things right

From north Philly to north Memphis to Cabrini Green

To all the wards, East L.A., y’all know what I mean

We from the same place as MJ and Martin Luther

Hip hop changed corner boys to producers

And if you look at it like that, It don’t seem that bad at all

You wanna know how to make it?

Just ask the Raw

No matter fact, the truth is dawg

Yo, you ain’t gotta ask at all, 'cause

If I was gonna tell somebody

I wanna make it clear that they see

Ain’t no room for hidin'

I want it to be you that would know

So I can describe my frustrations, or describe my love

Or describe the feeling, of looking up at a judge

Or describe the girls playin' double dutch

When we play kick ball

Or play catch a girl, get a girl

I know y’all remember that y’all

The hood that I love is the one without drive bys

Aye yo, the one we all love seen through a child’s eyes

I watch Happy Days, everyone was happy with glee

That’s when you think

«Why wasn’t it like that for me?»

But it’s all good because inside me is all hood

Now when I ride inside all leather and wood

Yo, make something out myself?

Didn’t know that I could 'cause livin' with poverty

Used to really bother me deep down inside

My tears never dried, anger kept me grounded

I never used my wings to fly

But I ain’t tell you how I felt about the hood, so y’all can hate it

I told you this so you can love it, and embrace it

If I was gonna tell somebody

I wanna make it clear that they see

Ain’t no room for hidin'

I want it to be you that would know