Nina

[Intro: Rapsody & Nina Simone] Southern trees Bearing strange fruit (Bearing strange fruit) Blood on the leaves (Blood on the leaves) And blood at the root, check (And blood at the roots) So bleed [Verse: Rapsody] Emit light, rap, or Emmett Till I drew a line without showing my body, that's a skill Bad to the bone and the grill You'd be dead wrong if looks killed I'm still on my spill, in the spirit of L. Hill Eye on the sparrow, nose like a pharaoh's Our bloodline trill for the young and all the lils We all gon' get mils Talk a lot of game but we get paid to like Jemele Was raised upon a hill, the valley's a sunken place I'm just tryna build like I came with some kettle weight Know I'm a god emcee, 'cause nigga, I made the devil wait 'Fore I brought hell, you ain't gotta tell me I'm hella great I don't speak on it nowadays, I just meditate Y'all can have the bars, nigga, I spit hard metal gates Henry Louis Gates when I cop me some new estate Make room for myself, I'm in a way different mental place I keep it real, all y'all look anime I'm fine like Anna Mae, black don't crack like Angela Black and brave like in the A, it don't come with apologies 'Less it's Tip and some Andre, when you greet me it's, "Namaste" Spread love the Brooklyn way or like marmalade No matter if you street street or more like the promenade We gotta come together like the corn and the dookie braids For the present and future days, I say what I gotta say I am Nina and Roberta, the one you love but ain't heard of Got my middle finger up like Pac after attempted murder Failed to kill me, it's still me, woke up singing Shirley Murdock As we lay these edges down, brown women, we so perfect Went from field nigga to still nigga, being cropped out the picture But we all know who got the juice, my sisters Imitating us in all the Hollywood pictures And still, they'll never be us, nigga (Nigga) I'm from the back woods where Nina would Sing about the life we should lead A new dawn, another deed, I try to do some good I felt more damned than Mississippi was They deny Nina in Philadelphia And still we persevere like all the 400 years of our own blood, Africa Old panthers lookin' back like who gon' come up after us? Outside the movies, I make sure before it move you It moved me, now bow down to a queen, please Survival [Outro: Reyna Biddy] Here's to the honey in you To the bittersweet in me I will shed this blood so romantically, so viciously quiet Here's to a moment of silence I've poured and poured my soul again, here's to epiphanies There was never a we There was you all and there was me In this war, likely to succeed Unlike me to surrender Trying and dying to breathe poetry to rise in the light of day To subconsciously exist cautiously ascending towards freedom Praying for a breather Do you see my pain? Do I seem like prey? Empathy be the reason you're still standing We are not the same I've lived more lives than you, I have less pride than you I'm extraterrestrial, I was created different I've been here many times before and I've never been defeated, and still I will never be defeated (Defeated)