[Hook]

Africa, Purta Prince, Knoxville, Ann Van, Manhattan, South Band, Albany, Brooklyn [x4]

Brooklyn, New York to wherever you at

This is autobiographical takin' you back

I lived a Charmed Life, we're going back in the years

Imagine if my whole world flashed before your ears


[Verse 1]

I've been around the sun 25 times,

And I still find new ways to recognize shine

It's like life gets better with age

The way a song sounds better on stage

And rhyme books get better with each page

Before the first bar was written'

Or first verse was spittin'

Before label excets was bullshittin'

Way back when Aunty Leen,

Aunt Mimi, and Aunt Jackie were babysittin'

Before food was bitten, consumed through a nipple

I'm talkin about when times were simple

To make a long story short it goes

Purta Prince, Knoxville, Ann Van

Love in the City that never sleeps

Some thoughts to finish, I was born just a couple of weeks late

Stay home long just to mke sure everything was on straight

All systems go, cut the umbilical chord

From old earth to new earth Manhattan to turf

For what it's worth, my mom held me down one deep

Pops was absentee, but minds you don't see

It took a village to raise me, Leen tought me how to read

By the time I went to school, I was at high speed

Ready willing and able, Jackie tought me how to add

With dried up black-eyed peas on the kitchen table

And coming ome to a mother's love and good care

Never wantin' him, it was always enough

Except when it came to education,

It's like she had one rule,

There's no such thing as too much school

Not to mention Leen tought me how to play the piano

And then, every summer I was out at South Bnd

Grampaps a bartender at a country club

Me and my cousin from Grand Rapids was livin it up

Me Granny watchin Notre Dame football

Gold and blue, she said you can't beat the team and the beans too

Some say I got my sense of humor from her

And I got my patience from making models in the basement

Brooklyn, New York to where ever you at

This is autobiographical, takin you back

With no time for refrains,

I barely got enough time to explain

How hip hop captivated my brain

My momma raised me on Soul to Beethoven

Sports Club and private school put me on soft rock

Thats was cool, but i left C100 and WPLJ to find bliss from BLS and KISS

Video music rock showed me what time it is, wrote my first rhymes to Corey

But De La was (buck?), makin pause-mix demos with my main man Mark

We playin ball in the park, there were other heads too

I was the herb of the crew, then I learned what to do

Got my weight up at shcool, started battling fools

D-Night, my friendly rival at the lunch table

He started spark in the dark

But Damien and I date

I was down for a bit, but that was just to DJ

Started spinnin in the PJ's with Facho and them

Back and forth from the tables to the Pad and the pen

But then I had to do a bid up state, but wait

I wasn't incarcerated, but college-educated

At SUNY Albany I was a full time student, part-time emcee

At the time (Rawshack?) was the place to be

Livin' on dutch quall, started buildin' with gods

16 man squad, by the time my knowledge 120, we was just 5 deep

I went from Mecca to Albany a student,

And landed in Medena

A havis rhyme reacha

You recognize whats happenin'

I'm makin records and I'm winnin'

But thats another story and thats only the begening

Brooklyn, New York to where ever you at

This is autobiographocal, taken you back

Not my whole entire life, just a slice of the pie

A few pieces of the who but when, wheres, and whys