LA inspired Respiration

[Mos Def and crew]
So much on my mind I just can't recline
Blastin holes in the night til she bled sunshine
Breathe in, inhale vapors from bright stars that shine
Breathe out, weed smoke retrace the skyline
Yo how the bass ride out like an ancient mating call
I can't take it y'all, I can feel the city breathing
Chest heavin, against the flesh of the evening
Kiss the Ide's goodbye, I'm on the last train leaving

So much on my mind I just can't recline

From where I sit, I look over the hood and so much as changed.  People have changed, the feel has changed the integrity is no longer valid.  Once upon a time there was some sort of love for the hood but now it has dwindled down.  It’s not all for the better but not all for the worse.  I see planes fly across smoggy skies but on a clear day my downtown is visual.  The ghetto bird hovers most nights bringing attention to the overrated element of who’s hood is it with territories marked on sidewalks, walls, buildings, peoples garage doors and even sometimes the church.  Yes, the blatant disrespect is prevalent.  I remember a time when passing cars would turn down the music when passing a church during service.  A time when marking territory didn’t include the dwellings of God’s temples in the hood but as I stated the hood has changed.  This was a time when there was some sort of respect and someone’s house, church or neighborhood businesses were not marked by individuals claiming territory that is not necessarily theirs to claim.  When folks in the hood weren’t held captive by bars to feel safe in a place of the American dream was consumed by unemployment and foreclosures in spite of red/blue claims that don’t really belong to them without no real pride or care for the hood.

So much on my mind I just can't recline

Breathe in, inhale vapors from bright stars that shine
Breathe out, weed smoke retrace the skyline

Once upon a time Parks Market was on 92^nd and Western.  Their store

sat right off the corner as extended family watching the kids grow up and create a place that was constant and ever present force for generations.  They loved, knew neighbors by name and even employed the hood.  The Parks were the corner fresh meat and even fried fish market always open and generally available.  Now as I sit back and look over that off the corner lot all that is left is a piece of the foundation  to the building the held Mr. and Mrs. Parks for so long and was so positive.  Their place of hope lost.  The hope to rebuild didn’t give fuel to their desire.  Now a Dollar Tree but not of the growing family friendly kind.  It is just an existing presence.  All that exist is the liquor store across that makes money supplying some drunken tangents in a parking lot housing used condoms from the strawberries of the night.  The devastation with conflict of mind and giving up on all that could have been.  I see folks living for their work along with their dealing and scheming.  We all have a story but it’s just said to see my people doped up, cracked in and strung out.  Their heavily medicated souls estranged from their minds.  I look over it and across it all and my soul is disturbed.  It’s just sad seeing the hood not live to its potential.

So much on my mind I just can't recline

Breathe in, inhale vapors from bright stars that shine
Breathe out, weed smoke retrace the skyline

In the city of angels where we tend to bleed purple and gold supporting our hometown boys doesn’t keep the dope boys constantly stand watch shaking hands and staring at girls no yet old enough to understand the functions of their temple yet they speak of sharing it with each other and almost any other.  They don’t want to hold onto their innocence in hopes of growing up quick and having matchless materials or attention from what they may or may not have had.  There is now a time where sex is too often taken for granted and not so much into the pleasure.  All for more attention and even more attention confusing lust for love the some smoking and snorting to escape the reality.  The reality of babies having babies, some misusing their babies for the next high due to strung heads wandering dark sheets seeking the next hit of whatever, however with whomever only discovering forever lost innocence.  Yet the go along with their stories untold with ass cheeks hanging in site attempting to attract their next dollar but its mumbled across the hood yet there is no help or encouragement given. No love, little hope and just simply trying to make it. Damn the hood has changed or has it only just become more visible as it was all done in the dark and has all come to light.

So much on my mind I just can't recline

Breathe in, inhale vapors from bright stars that shine
Breathe out, weed smoke retrace the skyline

The large span of land surrounded by water divided by so many cities and so many ethnic groups. My hood was once white when my grandparents bought their home and then it when my mother graduated from high school in the same hood it grew very black and now as I have grown up, moved away and came back it has become more brown.  The complexions vary but the hood is still changing.  The crime is black on black and brown on brown and sometimes conflicts to black and brown.  My hood has a church on almost every other corner yet there is a need for more than a little prayer.  The overrated affiliates prey over their red and blue in my black and brown hood with no real care for the hood we all share.  Breathe in the hope that they will see the banging is not a true way of life and keepin it real will make you casualty of abnormal normality.  It won’t continue to be a place where what set you’re from won’t conclude with life taken.  Just to leave the hood to go to another is along the 405, 110, 105 and it’s simple to hop on the 207, 105, and 550 to just get away. No matter the situation there is always sunshine and gloom in the same moment.  The sky is clear and it may be a beautiful day but it never dismisses the things that go on in the hardly ever quiet hood but like Cube stated you always look forward to the opportunity to say today was a good day.

Skyscrapers is colossus, the cost of living
is preposterous, stay alive, you play or die, no options
No Batman and Robin, can't tell between
the cops and the robbers, they both partners, they all heartless
With no conscience, back streets stay darkened
Where unbeliever hearts stay hardened

Mos Def

Not knowing the ways'll get you capped like an NBA salary
Some cats be emceeing to illustrate what we be seeing
Hard to be a spiritual being when shit is shakin what you believe in
Talib Kweli