[Hook: Nicole Wray] City lights wherever you are I'm solely drifting into New York [Verse 1: Najee] Yo everybody want to be heir to the throne They like wait till I get it Ain't no crown in New York cause Biggie died with it Corona and limes what I'm sipping Stare at the page configuring ways to write different Yours and my life is in no way compatible My upbringing would have mentally damaged you I let the ink tell it, deep stories in my melons Stories of perseverance, refusal of failing Money making Manhattan turn a snot nose into a captain Life and times told through rapping Home of the haze there's plenty of ways to get paid Beware of aids, k**ers with no names known to spray Pretty mommies with plenty booty Bodegas, parked outside, you got the chummy churies Old timers playing dominos dropping j**els If you listen then you guaranteed to glisten in it [Hook] Uh another worm out of The Big Apple Where I earned my stripes like Mickey Mantle Word to the torch held by The Statue of Liberty You cannot un-Kindle me It's a love-hate relationship damn near
My family was lost to the cracks here So I learned every block, observed every crack here Po-9 finds us a very big catch here Lights camera action Welcome to Manhattan the city I run laps in Harlem through the Heights and the Bronx son The hood's Mike Johnson Made moves in gold shoes Green in Oz's, Bk throughout Queens they know the 2 Es Victim of the system, child of the state Overlooking the city I see my face in [Hook] Yo, Naj the Don, urban version of The New York Times The city's in my every line I project the ghetto where Projectiles eject out the metal Be clear, the unbalanced attitude will get you leveled out here Navy Blue fitted with the NY logo Lees and a discrete Polo moving dolo Roll with a G through this cold concrete On these streets life's lost over Bs and Cs Dot all Is cross those Ts Check both sides when you cross those streets They shoot things Damn I love this surface 80s baby Kool Herc helped birth this Where heroes were made through h**n 5 boroughs, the most thorough in