🎙 Intro (spoken, ambient)
(Street sounds, sirens in the background)
I ain't ask for this life...
But I ain't never ducked it neither.
---
🎶 Hook (8 bars, melodic pain-style sing-rap)
Came up cold, where the love don’t last,
Hood taught me lessons that the books won’t pass.
Steel in my coat, pain tucked in my laugh,
Swear I lost myself in that broken glass.
Seen dreams get sold, seen blood get spilled,
Only way out is the hunger and will.
So I sleep with one eye and a grip on fate,
Made peace with the war—now it’s too late.
---
📝 Verse 1 (your original, no changes)
Had to hustle in the cold, same hoodie for weeks,
Felt the heat from the block more than food in my cheeks.
Used to stash it in the wall, behind grandma’s plaques,
Now my name in they mouth like a thousand racks.
Took the long way home, just to duck them raids,
Now the car push start where the cuffs once laid.
Upgraded the sheets, but the nights still rough,
Steel under the pillow—never sleep too tough.
Got a scar on my lip from a fight at the wake,
He ain’t cry for his kin, so I questioned the snake.
Used to pray on my sins with a grip on the Glock,
Church shoes off—had to slide on the opp.
Keep the mask in the dash like COVID back,
Still immune to the rats and emotional traps.
Never danced with the feds, I just two-stepped pain,
Put my heart in a box, now it don’t feel the same.
---
🎶 Hook (Repeat)
Came up cold, where the love don’t last,
Hood taught me lessons that the books won’t pass.
Steel in my coat, pain tucked in my laugh,
Swear I lost myself in that broken glass.
Seen dreams get sold, seen blood get spilled,
Only way out is the hunger and will.
So I sleep with one eye and a grip on fate,
Made peace with the war—now it’s too late.
---
🔥 Verse 2 (New 16 bars)
Tried to walk straight, but the curb too close,
Every time I bend light, it just burn my ghost.
Lost kin to the pipe, lost bros to beef,
Some names in my phone still show, but don’t speak.
Had a cell with no view, just concrete breath,
That’s when I learned you could die without death.
Mama cried when I lied about cleanin’ my act,
But the money came fast, and I ain’t turn back.
Got a cross on my chest and a blade in my jeans,
Faith in my fist and a war in my genes.
Tales in my hood never come with an end,
Just a GoFundMe and a “he was a friend.”
I been broke, I been hunted, I been out on E,
Still ten toes down when the devil found me.
You could paint me in blood, I won't fade in fear,
Real ones die young or disappear.
---
🎶 Hook (Final chorus with vocal layering + harmony)
Came up cold, where the love don’t last,
Hood taught me lessons that the books won’t pass.
Steel in my coat, pain tucked in my laugh,
Swear I lost myself in that broken glass.
Seen dreams get sold, seen blood get spilled,
Only way out is the hunger and will.
So I sleep with one eye and a grip on fate,
Made peace with the war—now it’s too late.
---
🎤 Outro (Spoken, faded)
Some of us just built for the shadows.
Ain’t no ligh