[Intro] [Immediate kick, no buildup. Voice enters like it already won.] You mispronounced my name. Let me help you with that. [Verse 1] Soft hands — I clocked that. Cuff link, clean slate. Carpet stain, cold rain — same weight, same fate. Three winters, same pants, bus seat, borrowed light. Went to bed with questions that your textbooks couldn't write. Your father's father built the firm — I built from the stain. Turned that dirt into a brain, that brain into a name. You cite the precedent — I am the precedent. New case. Walked into your language like I owned the place — I own the place. All your Latin, all your case law, every wall you hid behind I learned them on a bus, fluorescent light, the borrowed kind. While you were underlining with a brand-new pen, I memorized the whole damn canon with a library card and burning eyes. [Pre-Chorus] [Beat pulls back to kick. One breath.] They used to laugh when I raised my hand. Go ahead. Laugh now. [Chorus] [Full force. Chanted, not sung.] Parse this — Loaded every word. I don't miss. Parse this — Your language. My mouth. My fist. Parse this — Learned the code. Changed all the locks. I'm the sentence now. You're just the punctuation. [Verse 2] [Slower, surgical.] You said "articulate" — like it surprised you. Stop right there. That word's a leash. You clip it on the ones who shouldn't dare to sound like you. I heard it once — eleven, blazer borrowed — teacher smiled and said "articulate" like I'd climbed above my station. Let me give it back: you're articulate — for a trust fund, a legacy admission, and a father on the board. Articulate — for someone every door was held wide open who still can't build a sentence that could make a courtroom listen. I don't argue — I dismantle. Brick by brick, clause by clause. Find the cracks you plastered over — load-bearing flaws. Your confidence is architecture — beautiful, hollow. One question in the right place. The whole thing follows. [Pre-Chorus] [Kick only. One breath.] They said I'd never sit at this table. I bought the building. [Chorus] [Full force. Chanted, not sung.] Parse this — Loaded every word. I don't miss. Parse this — Your language. My mouth. My fist. Parse this — Learned the code. Changed all the locks. I'm the sentence now. You're just the punctuation. [Bridge] [Beat almost stops. Kick only. Voice drops to certainty.] My mother cleaned floors so I could read books. My mother cleaned floors so I could stand here. Every word I know is hers — paid in bleach, paid in hours, paid in hands that cracked before the winter. You want to know my credentials? I'm still here. And you can't look away. [Verse 3] [Full intensity. Tightest verse.] I read your brief — clean, pressed, perfectly forgettable. I read your life — same shape: inherited, respectable. You never had to be exceptional — just adequate. I had to be the best in every room just not to get laughed at. So here I am. Same room. Different door. You inherited the table — I rebuilt the floor. You're watching something money never taught you: fluency. Gutter to podium — every register. That's me. I code-switch like I breathe — block, boardroom, bench, bar. Wore every accent like a scar. You got one voice. Born with it. Handed down. I built mine — syllable by syllable — from the ground. [Chorus] [Final. Hardest delivery.] Parse this — Loaded every word. I don't miss. Parse this — Your language. My mouth. My fist. Parse this — Learned the code. Changed all the locks. I'm the sentence now. You're just the punctuation. [Outro] [Beat fades to kick. Voice calm, absolute.] You mispronounced my name. Don't worry. You'll remember it now.
