Mathematics Lyrics - Black On Both Sides - Mos Def

Ha ha 

You know the deal 

It's just me yo 

Beats by Su-Primo for all of my peoples, Negros and Latinos 

And even the gringos 

Yo, check it one for Charlie Hustle, two for Steady Rock 

Three for the fourth coming live, future shock 

It's five dimensions, six senses 

Seven firmaments of heaven to hell, 8 Million Stories to tell 

Nine planets faithfully keep in orbit 

With the probable tenth, the universe expands length 

The body of my text posses extra strength 

Power-lifting powerless up, out of this, towering inferno 

My ink so hot it burn through the journal 

I'm blacker than midnight on Broadway and Myrtle 

Hip-Hop past all your tall social hurdles 

Like the nationwide projects, prison-industry complex 

Broken glass wall better keep your alarm set 

Streets too loud to ever hear freedom sing 

Say evacuate your sleep, it's dangerous to dream 

But you chain cats get they CHA-POW, who dead now 

Killing fields need blood to graze the cash cow 

It's a number game, but shit don't add up somehow 

Like I got, sixteen to thirty-two bars to rock it 

But only 15% of profits, ever see my pockets like 

Sixty-nine billion in the last twenty years 

Spent on national defense but folks still live in fear like 

Nearly half of America's largest cities is one-quarter black 

That's why they gave Ricky Ross all the crack 

Sixteen ounces to a pound, twenty more to a ki 

A five minute sentence hearing and you no longer free 

40% of Americans own a cell phone 

So they can hear, everything that you say when you ain't home 

I guess, Michael Jackson was right, "You Are Not Alone" 

Rock your hardhat black cause you in the Terrordome 

Full of hard niggas, large niggas, dice tumblers 

Young teens and prison greens facing life numbers 

Crack mothers, crack babies and AIDS patients 

Young bloods can't spell but they could rock you in PlayStation 

This new math is whipping motherfuckers ass 

You wanna know how to rhyme you better learn how to add 

It's mathematics 

"The Mighty Mos Def" 

"It's simple mathematics" 

"Check it out!" 

"I revolve around science" 

"What are we talking about here?" 

"The Mighty Mos Def" 

"It's simple mathematics" 

"Check it out!" 

"I revolve around science" 

"What are we talking about here?" 

"Do your math" [Repeat: x2] 

"One.. t-t-two.. three, four" 

"What are we talking about here?" 

Yo, it's one universal law but two sides to every story 

Three strikes and you be in for life, manditory 

Four MC's murdered in the last four years 

I ain't trying to be the fifth one, the millennium is here 

Yo it's 6 Million Ways to Die, from the seven deadly thrills 

Eight-year olds getting found with 9 mill's 

It's 10 P.M., where your seeds at? What's the deal 

He on the hill puffin krill to keep they belly filled 

Light in the ass with heavy steel, sights on the pretty shit in life 

Young soldiers trying to earn they next stripe 

When the average minimum wage is $5.15 

You best believe you gotta find a new ground to get cream 

The white unemployment rate, is nearly more than triple for black 

So front liners got they gun in your back 

Bubbling crack, jewel theft and robbery to combat poverty 

And end up in the global jail economy 

Stiffer stipulations attached to each sentence 

Budget cutbacks but increased police presence 

And even if you get out of prison still living 

Join the other five million under state supervision 

This is business, no faces just lines and statistics 

From your phone, your zip code, to S-S-I digits 

The system break man child and women into figures 

Two columns for who is, and who ain't niggas 

Numbers is hardly real and they never have feelings 

But you push too hard, even numbers got limits 

Why did one straw break the camel's back? Here's the secret: 

The million other straws underneath it, it's all mathematics 

"The Mighty Mos Def" 

"It's simple mathematics" 

"Check it out!" 

"I revolve around science" 

"What are we talking about here?"