The Message

The Message by Grandmaster Flash

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

Broken glass everywhere

People pissing on the stairs, you know they just don’t care

I can't take the smell, I can't take the noise

Got no money to move out, I guess I got no choice

Rats in the front room, roaches in the back

Junkies in the alley with the baseball bat

I tried to get away, but I couldn't get far

Cause a man with a tow-truck repossessed my car

Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh

2nd and 5th: ah huh-huh-huh

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

Standing on the front stoop, hangin' out the window

Watching all the cars go by, roaring as the breezes blow

4th: say what?

Crazy lady livin' in her bag

Eating out of garbage piles, used to be a fag-hag

Such a nice to tango, skipped her life and then go

In search of her prince it seemed she lost her senses

Down at the peepshow, watching all the creeps

So she can tell the stories to the girls back home

She went to the city and got social security

She had to get a pimp, she couldn't make it on her own

Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh

2nd and 5th: ah huh-huh-huh

4th: say what?

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

My brother's doing best on my mother's TV

She says: “You watch it too much, it’s just not healthy!”

“All My Children” in the daytime, “Dallas” at night

Can even see the game or the Sugar Ray fight

The bill collectors they ring my phone

And scare my wife when I'm not home

Got a bum education, double-digit inflation

I can’t take the train to the job, there's a strike at the station

Neon King Kong standin' on my back

Can't stop to turn around, broke my sacroiliac

A mid-ranged migraine, cancered membrane

Sometimes I think I'm going insane, I swear I might hijack a plane

Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh

2nd and 5th: ah huh-huh-huh

4th: say what?

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

My son said: ”Daddy I don't wonna go to school

Cause the teacher's a jerk!”, he must think I'm a fool

And all the kids smoke reefer, I think it'd be cheaper

If I just got a job, learned to be a street sweeper

I’ll dance to the beat, shuffle my feet

Wear a shirt and tie and run with the creeps

Cause it's all about money, ain't a damn thing funny

You got to have a con in this land of milk and honey

They pushed that girl in front of the train

Took her to the doctor, sewed her arm on again

Stabbed that man right in his heart

Gave him a transplant for a brand new start

I can't walk through the park, cause it's crazy after dark

Keep my hand on my gun, cause they got me on the run

I feel like a outlaw, broke my last glass jar

Hear them say: “You want some more livin' on a seesaw?”

Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh

2nd and 5th: ah huh-huh-huh

4th: say what?

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under

A child is born with no state of mind

Blind to the ways of mankind

God is smiling on you but he's frowning too

Because only God knows what you’ll go through

You’ll grow in the ghetto, living second rate

And your eyes will sing a song of deep hate

The places you’re playin’, where you stay

Looks like one great big alley way

You'll admire all the number book takers

Thugs, pimps, pushers and the big money makers

Driving big cars, spending twenties and tens

And you wonna grow up to be just like them, huh,

Smugglers, scrambles, burglars, gamblers

Pickpockets, peddlers even panhandlers

You say: “I'm cool, I'm no fool!”

But then you wind up dropping out of high school

Now you're unemployed, all non-void

Walking ‘round like you're Pretty Boy Floyd

Turned stickup kid, look what you’ve done did

Got sent up for a eight year bid

Now your manhood is took and you're a may tag

Spend the next two years as a undercover fag

Being used and abused to serve like hell

Till one day you was found hung dead in a cell

It was plain to see that your life was lost

You was cold and your body swung back and forth

But now your eyes sing the sad, sad song

Of how you lived so fast and died so young

Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh

2nd and 5th: ah huh-huh-huh

4th: say what?

It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under