NO HOME TO GO HOME TO
he said ‘negro, you should be happy that you’re here to america’
he said if it wasn’t for him and his fellow christians on their civilizing missions
he said i would still be in africa—with those uncivilized savages
he said I’d be there with the backward soulless people of the world
the ones who have no history nor future
he said i should be grateful i was brought to this great land
happy to call america my home
but i know in my heart i can never really call america my home
because if this was my home they wouldn’t treat me the way they do
and if what they saying about africa is true
i don’t wanna go back there either
so I’m starting to feel like i ain’t got a home to go home to
they got me sharecropping on a piece of worthless land
and it seems like the more i make
the more they take
season after season, a bigger balance is due
and at the end of the harvest
i have nothing to go home to
and when i thought about moving up north
he said you can’t go nowhere
said i couldn’t leave until i paid you all i owed, so
still ain’t nothing to go home for
my kids can’t go to school like other children do
they gotta help me work in the fields
because of the money i owe you
so in the eyes of my kids
thanks to you
coming home is no home to go home to
they got me working, doing odd jobs
seems like even the salvation of my soul
is being used to maintain their life of leisure
now my heart could never explain somebody else’s pain
but why would she say i raped her
why would she say i raped her when in reality
she couldn’t keep her hands off me
told me not to tell a soul cause she gonna cross me
now they are burning crosses all around town
burned my house down to the ground
now what am i going to do
cause i don’t have no home to go home to
they got their dogs and their guns
they are coming after me, for something i didn’t do
in her heart, she knows it’s true
and i refuse to die for her lie, to be blamed for her shame
my wife said, you can try to explain but the truth they ain’t gone believe
they ain’t going to be happy until you hanging from one of those trees
my grandmother says son, the all you can do is run child
please just leave
she said if you don’t leave tonight
you won’t live to see the morning light
So now I’m running
i know where I’m running from
but i don’t know where I’m running to
cause it seems like i ain’t got no home to go home to
but i’m running
running through the darkness of the woods
i am guided by the light of my mother’s face
i’m running to the memories of my mother’s smile
i remember being taken out of my mother’s arms as a child
i’m running
like i am racing against my childhood memories
i remember my grandmother telling me
that i laid in the blood that spilled when my father got killed
she said ‘but they can never kill his spirit’
she said that’s why they call me nnamdi cause it means
my father is inside of me
she said that’s igbo our native tongue
from the land east of benin where our people come from
so although it seems like i don’t
i guess i really do got a home to go home to
but i can’t
i wish i could run back to those african shores
but i can’t
i run until i can’t run no more
but my mind’s still running
thinking about my family and how much they’re going to miss me
as i stand on the banks of the mississippi
and i say to God, that i don’t know what to do
and then the face of the river became the face of God
and He smiled
and said come on home child, you got a home to come home to
and it seemed that the more the river roared
the more God said He loved me
then He stretched open His arms
like He was just waiting to hug me
and as my feet leave this loveless land
i hear my grandmother on her knees prayin/sayin
‘precious lord please take my baby’s hand’
and although it’s the middle of the winter
the water was warm
and this world can’t do me no harm
cause now I’m in God’s arms
and i know He’s real
i can feel Him holding me tight.
as I’m carried under and away by the current of the river
i don’t fight
cause i know God is going to bring me home
tonight
