Rapsody’s new album ‘EVE’ is a stunning piece of work, both lyrically and musically. In “NINA”, she walks a tightrope between serenity and fighting spirit. The self-directed video isn’t on the same level as the song tbh, but that shouldn’t stop you from watching, listening and using it as a gateway to the album. See you on the other side!
NINA
Bearing strange fruit / Blood on the leaves / And blood at the root / So bleed
Verse One
Emit light, Rap or Emmett / Till I drew a line without showing my body, that’s a skill / Bad to the bone and the grill / You’d be dead wrong if looks killed I’m still on my spill, in the spirit of L. / Hill Eye on the sparrow, / Nose like a pharoah’s / Our bloodline trill for the young and all the lil’s / We all gon’ get mills / Talk a lot of game but we get paid to like Jemele / Was raised upon a Hill / The valleys a sunken place / I’m just tryna build like I came with some kettle weight / Know I’m a God emcee ‘cus ni*** I made the devil wait / ‘Fo I brought hell, you ain’t gotta tell me Im hella great / I don’t speak on it nowadays, I just meditate / Yall can have the bars, ni*** I spit hard metal gates / Henry Louis Gates when I cop’ me some new estate / Make room for myself, I’m in a way different mental place / I keep it real, all y’all look anime / I’m fine like Anna Mae, black don’t crack like Angela / Black and brave like in the A / It don’t come with apologies ‘less it’s Tip and some Andre’ / When you greet me it’s Namaste / Spread love the Brooklyn way or like marmalade / No matter if you street street or more like the promenade / We gotta come together like the corn and the dookie braids / For the present and future days, / Imma say what I gotta say / I am Nina and Roberta / The one you love but ain't heard of / Got my middle finger up like Pac after attempted murder / Failed to kill me, it’s still me / Woke up singing Shirley Murdock / As we lay these edges down brown women we so perfect / Went from field ni*** to still ni***, being cropped out the picture / But we all know who got the juice, my sistahs / Imitating us in all the Hollywood pictures / And still they'll never be us, ni*** I from the back woods where Nina would / Sing about the life we should lead a new dawn, another deed; / I tried to do some good / Felt more damned than Mississippi was / They denied Nina in Philadelphia / And still she persevered like all the 400 years of our own blood / Africa! / Old Panthers looking back like ‘who gon’ come up after us?” / Outside the movies, I make sure before it move you / It moves me / Now bow down to a Queen, please / Survival. / Reyna Biddy Spoken word: / Here’s to the honey in you / To the bitter sweet in me / I’ve shed this blood so romantically / So viciously quiet / Here’s to a moment of silence / I’ve poured and poured my soul again / Here’s to epifanies / There was never a we / There was you all and there was me / In this war likely to succeed / Unlike me to surrender / Trying and dying to breathe poetry / To rise in the light of day / To subconsciously exist cautiously ascending towards freedom / Praying for a breather / Do you see my pain? / Do I seem like prey? / Empathy be the reason we are still standing / We are not the same I’ve lived more lives than you / I have less pride than you / I am extraterrestrial / I was created different / I’ve been here many times before / And I’ve never been defeated / And still….I will never be defeated.
