DOPE: "A Letter To The Law" by Common

Truth be told, I was fully prepared not to do a DOPE entry this week. But then my honey sent me this article in the Huffington Post about the OUTRAGE over Michelle Obama inviting Common to the White House to recite poetry!! The source of the dismay is an article in The Daily Caller written by Neil Munro cites this week's DOPE poem as an example of Common's violent and incendiary prose.

Here's the gotcha: As the author of the Huffingon Post article (Jason Linkin) points out, when saying "My Uzi Weighs A Ton", Common is referencing the Public Enemy song of that same name, a song that proudly declares that one's intellect is the greatest weapon.



After reading Munro's RI-DAMN-DICULOUS transcript of the poem (I am guessing Neil doesn't know many West Indians, or has ever listened to a reggae song in his life!), I knew that I had to post this poem, along with a corrected (As best I could do) transcript of the poem

A Letter to the Law

Dem boy wanna talk like they wanna gwan come
What you gon' do if you got one gun?
I sing a song for the hero unsung
With faces on the mural of the revolution
No looking back cause in back is what’s done
Tell the preacher, God got more than one son
Tell the law, my Uzi weighs a ton
I walk like a warrior, from them I won’t run

On the streets, they try to beat us like a drum
In Cincinnati, another brother hung
Again he won’t see the sun with his family stung
They want us to hold justice, but you handed me none

The same they did to Kobe and Michael Jackson
Make them the main attraction
Turn around and attack them
Black gem in the rough
You’re rugged enough
Use your mind and nine-power, get the government touch
Them boys chat-chat on how him pop gun
I got the black strap to make the cops run

They watching me, I’m watching them
Them dick boys got a lot of cock in them
My people on the block got a lot of Pac in them
And when we roll together
We be rocking them
to sleep

No time for that, because there’s things to be done
Stay true to what I do so the youth dream come
From project building
Seen a fiend being hung
With that happening, why they messing with Saddam?

Burn a Bush cause for peace he no push no button
Killing over oil and grease no weapons of destruction
How can we follow a leader when this a corrupt one
The government’s a g-unit and they might buck young
Black people
Black people
In the urban area one
I hold up a peace sign, but I carry a gun.
Peace, ya’ll.