Last Day of School

Song: Last Day of School

Album: Lesser Restoration

Artist: Toussaint Morrison

Written by: Toussaint Morrison

Released April 7, 2017

ref: https://open.spotify.com/album/2xDGe5lTRyhXybig0em0P5

Oh, I

I used to believe

In their definition of free

I’d go to class

And days go by

While they taught someone else’s history

But when I left

For good this time

I found my story right here in this street

And when I came to tell ya

That I found the truth

They told me that God awful bad news

-

Chorus

They said a young man was

Shot down yester-eve

Another number and a non-white face

Well, hot damn, what’s come over me

My heart is beatin’, but I can’t feel a thing

Inside-out, it’s all empty

They teach us lies ‘til we dig our own graves

But not now, not me

Not ‘til I make the city sing your name

-

It’s tougher to buy your principal’s bullshit than a bullet

Discount ammunition at Walmart ain’t hard to sell

We both know there’s no part of a 16 year old

Bleedin’ from a hole in his chest that can be saved by the bell

I’m in it, I’m in it, from standardized lives to colonized minds

Who’da thought middle-age from brown males would be the age’a 8 and 9

They called a new principal to save ya school and make a scholar

But I wouldn’t trust that slave driver to save a dollar

Security and c-o-p’s God-complex’ll make ya holla

But hell forbid you teach how the rich stay rich and light a fire for the rest of the class to follow

A paper trail, all the way from the bottom to the H.M.I.C., intern to the top of the office

Of a school board flunkin’ a demographic to jobless, impoverished, or droppin’ dead

Droppin grades, poppin lead and droppin pens

I dropped the school and now I’m droppin’ ed. and droppin’ debt

Born upon a ledge and all they wanna do is push- push me off of it

But don’t get wide eyed and surprised when the precinct lieutenant is callin in

Chorus

United Crushers, we fight, fly, and die amongst us

Collide at lunch rush, a cafeteria of misguided assumptions

And the roof we’re under dudn’t do much but give in and catalyze the plunder

White principals tryin’ to find a resolution for the racial tension they never had to suffer

Books on books on books of A.P. U.S. History,

But somehow the syllabus always dodges John Brown and Garvey

It’s Malcolm X Day, no class for me.

I’m just kickin’ it with Driss and Abdulaziz

We were 10, with middle school dreams of becomin’ police, firemen, presidents, controllers

Of our destiny until the floor boards gave in and the curtain dropped down and exposed a joke

Of a system hegemonizin’ at-risk young minds, inner-city and all over

From becomin’ future Assata Shakurs and Billy Powell Chief Osceolas

This is money, politics, and race in motion

Somebody stop the car, we need to figure out where we’re goin’

No one’s exempt, we’re all in it over, and under

Givin’ all of everything just to avoid another…

Chorus

-

Bridge

Oh, I

I used to believe

In their definition of free

I’d go to class

And days go by

While they taught someone else’s history

But when I left

For good this time

I found my story right here in this street

And when I came to tell ya

That I found the truth

They told me that God awful bad news

-

Chorus

It was a young man, like you

On any eve

Wrong place, wrong time, everything

Leads up to this legacy

Of little pride and so much shame

But right now, you and me

Have the chance to steer our fate

So, no one dies in vain