Caught in a Hustle

[Verse 1]<br>They say the odds against me, are crooked and impossible<br>Like I was born with a hole in my heart is an obstacle<br>I was left to die by the doctors, in the Children`s Hospital<br>But I never lose hope, success is psychological<br>The world is volatile and the street is my education<br>Shaping the nation, like the blueprint of a mason<br>While Shawshank record deals get you raped on occasion<br>So I`m focused on my economic situation<br>I`m like the little kids on TV that dig through the trash<br>I hustle regardless of the way you talk shit and laugh<br>A lot of niggaz drop science but they dont know the math<br>Because their mind is narrower than the righteous path<br>It`s funny how on the block niggaz will kill you for cash<br>But never raise the gun and cry out "Freedom at last"<br>The cold war is over but the world is still gettin colder<br>Atlas walking through the projects with the hood on my shoulders<br>I would like to raise my children to grow to be soldiers<br>But then the general, would decide when their life would be over<br>So I work hard until my personality split<br>Like the black panthers, into the bloods and the crips<br>They said I would never be shit, but now I sit and reminice<br>Like Yeshua ben Yusef flippin through Genesis<br>Ignorance is venemous, and it murders the soul<br>Spreading like a virus running rampant, but out of control<br><br>[Hook]<br>So if I should ever fall and get caught in a hustle<br>Let them know that I died while I fought in a struggle<br>From the hoodrats to the rich kids lost in a bubble<br>Spray painting on the streets and at the subway tunnels<br>Write it down and remember that we never gave in<br>The mind of a child is where the revolution begins<br>So if the solution has never been to look in yourself<br>How is it that you expect to find it anywhere else<br><br>[Verse 2]<br>Immortal Technique in the streets, back on the hustle<br>cause three strikes will get you life for stuffin cracks in a duffle<br>Upstate behind steel gates intact in the scuffle<br>Razor blades stuck on the side of pencils, hacked to your muscle<br>But the emptiness is what bleeds you to death when it cuts you<br>And its the lawyers, not the inmates scheming to fuck you<br>Trying to fight the system from inside, eventually corrupts you<br>But thats what you get when you put a corporation above you<br>And it`s the people that love you that seem to hurt you the most<br>Sometimes when they die you find yourself cursing their ghost<br>But you make success, nobody delivers your fate<br>Sometimes you give and you take<br>Since prehistoric vertibrates, crawled out of the lakes<br>And thats the truth about life<br>Or to do it to ghetto and your car, rims, and your ice<br>Because even though we survived through the struggle that made us<br>We still look at ourselves through the eyes of people that hate us<br>But I`m going to make it regardless of the trumped up charges<br>And semi-automatic barrages, that empty the cartridge<br>Post-traumatically scar kids that try to be brave<br>Because niggaz backstab each other just to try to get paid<br>Turn cannibal like nights during the crusades<br>Afraid of responsibility; addicted to greed<br>Beating their girls purposefully losing a seed<br>As if we were bound to the destiny we used to recieve<br><br>[Hook]<br><br>I used to wonder (I used to wonder) about people who don`t believe in themselves<br>But then I saw the way that they portrayed us to everyone else<br>That cursed us, then only see the worst in ourselves<br>blind to the fact the whole time we were hurting ourselves<br><br>I used to wonder (I used to wonder) about people who don`t believe in themselves<br>But then I saw the way that they portrayed us to everyone else<br>That cursed us, then only see the worst in ourselves<br>blind to the fact the whole time we were hurting ourselves<br><br>I used to wonder {*echo*}