HOPES AND SCREAMS

Yeah. Dusty drums, cold wind when the beat come in.

Vinyl crack, jazz keys — let the story begin.

40 years on the tick, I had to flip that script,

packed a duffle full of hopes, took a long cold trip.

Left the sun for the snow where the sidewalk bites,

with the frost on the glass blocking all my lights.

In a warehouse dance, got me breaking my frame,

stacking crates at the bottom of a fortune chain.

Got them letters on my papers, but they call me new —

high school wage for a master with a global view.

Got my fingers turning purple through these bargain gloves;

on these Calgary blocks they be freezing the love.

Little bars have to age with a half-full wall,

talk slick, gaslight, trying to make me small.

Minimum in my jeans, but the stress top tier —

trade blood for the rent, trade pride for the fear.

Swipe card for the bread just to keep us fed;

now I'm chained to the interest while I'm drowning in red.

They been talking about milk, they been talking about honey,

but the winters stay hungry and they eat through your money.

Is a Black man's dream just a ghost in the air

in a strange frozen world that forgets how to care?

Are we running to freedom or chasing a lie

under cold quiet stars of this northern sky?

Oh, they promised us milk, they promised us honey,

but the dark keeps coming and it swallows your money.

Flip a flick on the gram just to prove my breath,

city lights in the back, still I'm fighting death.

Inbox buzz from the block where I had my start —

they be tapping on my screen, put a price on my heart.

They think cash grows fast where the maple leaf flies;

they don't see heavy souls or the ice in my eyes.

They don't feel how this struggle put a bruise in my soul,

they just see blue stamps like a cheat code roll.

So I'm up past twelve, blue light on my face,

trying to rebuild worth in a foreign place.

Click, link, new ports, trying to level my name —

every badge, every doc just to enter the game.

Now I'm stepping in interviews with a quake in my chest,

second-guess every word though I know I'm the best.

Got my mind in a choke, questioning my birth,

like I'm trespassing here on this side of the earth.

They been talking about milk, they been talking about honey,

but the winters stay hungry and they eat through your money.

Is a Black man's dream just a ghost in the air

in a strange frozen world that forgets how to care?

Are we running to freedom or chasing a lie

under cold quiet stars of this northern sky?

Oh, they promised us milk, they promised us honey,

but the dark keeps coming and it swallows your money.

So I hustled up a vision with no sponsor hand,

tried to plant one seed in this concrete land.

Built hope from the crumbs, put a roof in a prayer,

but the light bill laughed, it ain't playing fair.

Every invoice hit, that's another short step;

every balance past due like a secret I kept.

Hit my knees on the floor where the pipes run cold,

crying out to the heavens till my voice unfold.

Painting pictures in my chest of a brighter lane,

manifest every bar while I spit this pain.

Out the hustle got breath, put the hunger to sleep;

got the keys that I wanted, but the scars still deep.

This success don't erase how the nights went long —

every win that I taste still attached to wrong.

Yeah, I built me a castle from my childhood bricks,

but the base still bleeds from the old school hits.

Through the storms, through the blizzards, held the shield on high,

kept the crack in my engine hiding from their eye.

Wife and kids never saw how the gears got torn;

every tear on my pillow was a verse unborn.

Gave them clean fresh tracks, less a hill to climb,

took the punches on my chest, paid it all in time.

Now I stare in the mirror, forty-plus, same name,

wonder if any smile can outlive this pain.

All the hopes, all the screams that I chased overseas

turned to pain and illusions in the Canadian freeze.

Cold wind in the breeze.