Gain the world and lose your soul/
Trying to see what the future holds but looking back to check if the suture’s closed/
Knew the road that I walk is often a lonely one/
Younger feeling in awkward in solitude, though it so becomes a lifeline/
And more essential as I grow with age/
finding peace in the silence deeper below the days/
Me and Magic would rhyme and keep up the flow to raise hell when we blow the stage/
You know the praise is all coming from heart/
Summon the spark, fan the fire, plan empires, call you my brother above the art/
Live parallels as well we’re both raising nieces/
And both found queens, somebody mama could meet with/
Don’t hide when I’m at my weakest, I showed her that side/
For the hardships, no man would have shoulders that wide/
Told her that’s why, it’s known but now I’ve gotta say it
that it’s because of yall I found my way in

[Chorus]
For the times when I should have said the words they deserve to hear/
And for the times that the feeling was more than what we’re feeling to share/
But this is for the time that we’re given/
find that it’s never too long before the given is gone/
So I’ve got to speak now, and I speak now/
Say the words, give them life, they deserve to hear it so live it right

Bit my tongue a thousand times/
Didn’t know how to find the words to let you know that you were out of line, doubt I’m blind/
Saw my sister leave with the kids and the bags packed/
But you’re collapsed up in the crib, too drunken to glance back/
I loved you like an older brother, so she’d never blow your cover
Never spoke of your other side, hoped we won’t discover/
So it’s tougher because she suffered alone/
kept appearances of parents, but this wasn’t a home/
Played the mother and the father figure/
Hard to picture how we never heard a sound as you drowned in the darkest liquor/
She said she needs a partner with her/
Felt safe in the storm and made it the norm, crazy how head and heart can differ/
And I know you’re hurting because nobody’s walking with you/
But you talk as if only you can be thought the victor/
and there’s no winners/
So either rebuild, or let her go, but know it needs to be real/

[Chorus]

Cried when my grandma passed, the ash scattered/
we last chatted about her childhood and laughed/
Bad as it seemed to see her weaken on a hospital bed,
Those are moments that I cherish, giving solace instead/
Because I really got to know her just talking, combing her hair/
She knew that death was calling, no stalling, go with a prayer/
But never dreamed she’d leave in summer/
Saw my grandfather weeping, he would then fall asleep in the deepest slumber/
8 months later, but shed no tears/
dead those fears, a story that I read so clear/
It’s just the universe at work/
didn’t understand it, feeling disenchanted/
But had to shift to a different vantage/ because life is made of give and take, interplay of high and low/
Work and rest, birth and death, learn then it’s your time to go/
So for every meal and minute that they gave us,
we’re better for having their hands to raise us