I think of crime, when I'm in a New York state of mind monkey flip‘em with the funky rhythym I be kickin’, Musician, inflictin’ composition of pain; I’m like Scarface sniffin cocaine. Holding an M-16, see with the pen I'm extreme now bullet holes left in my peepholes, I’m suited up in street clothes hand me a nine and I’ll defeat foes. Y’ALL KNOW MY STEELO with or without the airplay I keep some E&J, sitting bent up in the stairway. Or either on the corner betting grants with the cee-lo champs laughing at baseheads tryna sell some broken amps. G-packs get off quick, forever niggas talk shit reminiscing about the last time the Task Force flipped. Niggas be running through the block shootin’, time to start the revolution catch a body, head for Houston. Once they caught us off-guard, the Mac-10 was in the grass and I ran like a cheetah with thoughts of an assassin, pick the Mac up, told brothers, “back up” the Mac spit lead was hittin’ niggas, one ran - I made him backflip. Heard a few chicks scream, my arm shook, couldn’t look gave another squeeze, heard it click, “yo my shit is stuck”, try to cock it, it wouldn’t shoot, now I’m in danger, finally pulled it back and saw three bullets caught up in the chamber. So now I’m jetting to the building lobby and it was full of children probably couldn’t see as high as I be. It’s like the game ain’t the same got younger niggas pulling the triggers bringing fame to their name, and claim some corners crews without guns are goners. In broad daylight, stickup kids: they run up on us, 4-5’s and gauges, Macs, in fact same niggas will catch a back- to-back, snatching your cracks in black. There was a snitch on the block getting niggas knocked so hold your stash ‘til the coke price drop. I know this crackhead who said she’s got to smoke nice rock and if it’s good, she’ll bring you customers in measuring pots, but yo, you gotta slide on a vacation, inside information keeps large niggas erasin’ and their wives basin’. It drops deep as it does in my breath. I NEVER SLEEP, CAUSE SLEEP IS THE COUSIN OF DEATH Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined. I think of crime, when I’m in a New York state of mind. Be having dreams that I’m a gangsta, drinking Moets, holding Tecs. Making sure the cash came correct, then I stepped. Investments in stocks, sewing up the blocks, to sell rocks winning gunfights with mega-cops. But just a nigga walking with his finger on the trigger, make enough figures until my pockets get bigger. I ain’t the type of brother made for you to start testin’, give me a Smith & Wesson, I have niggas undressin’. Thinking of cash flow, buddah and shelter, whenever frustrated, I’m a hijack Delta. In the PJ’s, my blend tape plays, bullets are strays, young bitches is grazed, each block is like a maze. Full of black rats trapped plus the Island is packed, from what I hear in all the stories when my peoples come back, black. I’m living where the nights is jet-black, the fiends fight to get crack, I just max, I dream I can sit back. And lamp like Capone, with drug scripts sewn, or the legal luxury life, rings flooded with stones, holmes. I got too many rhymes, I don’t think I’m too sane life is parallel to hell but I must maintain, and be prosperous, though we live dangerous cops could just arrest me, blaming us, we’re held like hostages. It’s only right that I was born to use mics and the stuff that I write is even tougher than dykes. I’m taking rappers to a new plateau, through rap slow, my rhymin’ is a vitamin held without a capsule. The smooth criminal on beat breaks, never put me in your box if your shit eats tapes. The city never sleeps, full of villains and creeps, that’s where I learned to do my hustle, had to scuffle with freaks. I’M AN ADDICT FOR SNEAKERS 20’s of buddha and bitches with beepers, in the streets I can greet ya, about blunts I teach ya. Inhale deep like the words of my breath, I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death. I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times . Nothing’s equivalent to the NEW YORK STATE OF MIND I Rappers Quote by Nas from New York State of Mind on the album illmatic
