Artist: Nas

Song: Memory Lane [Sittin' In Da Park]

Album: Illmatic. 1994

Submitted by: staff@hiphoparchives.com

Corrections by: Joe Berhan. Note: These corrections are focused on capturing the M.C.'s true intentions. Although there are numerous errors in the lyrics entered in the Hip Hop Archives, Joe has focused only on significant errors in word choice, etc. 3/22/01

Listen

I rap for listeners, blunt heads, fly ladies, and prisoners,

Henessy holders and old school niggas.

Then I be dissin' a

Unofficial the mo' uly Thai

I dropped out of Cooley High

Gassed up by a cokehead cutie pie.

Jungle survivor, fuck who's the liver.

My man put the battery in my a bag of difference

From Energizer.

Sentence begins indented

With formality,

My duration's infinite,

Moneywise or physiology.

Poetry, that's a part of me,

retardedly bop.

I drop the ancient manifested hip hop

Straight off the block.

I reminisce on Park jams, my man was shot for a Sheath coat

The choco bless'll make me see him drop in my weed smoke.

It's real, grew up in trife life, did times or white lines

The hype price, murderous nighttimes

And knife fights invite crimes.

Chill on the block with cardiac hold strap

When my peeps that's in the drug money market interact.

No sign of a beast in a blue Chrysler,

I guess that means peace.

For niggas too sheist to fight, they'll just snipe ya' .

Start off the dice, rollin' mats for craps to C-lo

With side bets and roll a deuce, not the V- low.

Peace, God. Now the shit is explained.

I'm takin' niggas on a trip straight thru memory lane.

It's like that ch'all; It's like that ch'all; It's like that ch'all;

Chorus:

Let me take a trip down Memory Lane

Comin' out of Queensbridge

Verse 2

One for the money, two for pussy and foreign cars.

Three's for Alize niggas deceased and behind bars.

I rap divine god, check the prognosis

Is it real or showbiz?

My window faces shootouts, drug overdoses.

Live amongst no roses,

Only the drama.

For real, a nickel plate is my fate;

My medicine is the ganja.

Here's my basis: my razor embraces many faces,

Blue and black stitches of fat shoelaces.

Peoples are petro.

Dramatic, automatic .44 I let blow

And back down po po when I'm vex so.

My pen taps the paper then my brain's blank.

I see dark streets, hustlin' brothas who keep the same rank.

Pumpin' for somethin', some are prosperous, some fail.

Judges hangin' niggas, uncorrect bails for direct sales.

My intellect prevails from a hangin' cross with nails,

I reinforce the frail; with lyrics that's real.

Word to Christ, the disciple of streets, trifle on beats,

I decipher prophecies through a mic and say peace.

I hung around the older crews while they slinged smack to dingbats.

They spoke of Fat Cat, that nigga's name a bell rings, black.

Some fiends screamed about Supreme Team,

A Jamaica Queens thing.

Uptown was Alpo, son, heard he was kingpin.

Yo, fuck rap; it's real. Watch the Herb stand still,

Never talkin' to snakes 'cause the words of man kill.

True in the game, as long as blood is blue in my veins

I pour a Heineken brew to my deceased crew on memory lane.

Chorus