[Hook]
Africa, Purta Prince, Knoxville, Ann Van, Manhattan, South Band, Albany, Brooklyn (repeat 4x)
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
