Tell ‘Em The Truth

You know whenever I think about all the struggles and strife I've been through in my life
It's truly hard to comprehend
I mean, I'm sitting inside a cage on death row, yo
So far away from home, so far away from everything I know
Might as well be sitting inside the hold of a slave ship
That's what it feels like to be here

Yet it's hard sometimes to see how what I'm going through
Is connected to what my ancestors suffered and survived
Truth be told, I'm lucky to be alive, real talk

Sometimes when things get too heavy to carry
I close my eyes and drift back to a time when everything was all good
A time when it was fully understood that being here on this earth was the biggest blessing
My grandfather taught me that

You see I grew up in a neighborhood called The Village
A small enclave on the East side of Cleveland
A beautiful place, yo
With fruit trees and sweet things on every corner
No lie

I was surrounded by my family and friends then
I'm telling you, there was no end to the love we shared
A real community planned by people whose only plan was to live and give everything they had
They gave it all
Children of slaves who braved the worst of it
So we, their children and grandchildren, could make the most of it
Yeah

You know, to shield us from the pain of knowing the truth
They never explained what kind of society we were born into.
They didn't tell us about all the tricks and traps that were designed to re-enslave
Or about the hate that could deliver us to an early grave.

They wanted us to be free
They wanted us not to see all the ugliness around us
So a lot of us got caught up in the darkness
And lost the light that was meant to guide us through

Gotta tell the children the truth
Tell them it's not what they say, but what they do
Tell them the real about reality
That life isn't meant to be fair, that it's meant to be lived

Tell the children the truth, Yeah
Tell 'em the truth