Son Of A Soldier

I love you ma
From the bottom, thank you
I see the love, I see your sacrifice in my children's eyes
They were born free - incredible

Mama was a soldier, poppa was a preacher
That's a bible & a rifle, tell me that don't make believers
How do you get freedom
By evening the odds
Every evening she was cleaning the Kalashnikov
Show difficulty, she'd be there with much resolve
Taught me discipline
If they not with you, fuck them all
If you assess I
I'm a product of the USSR
I seen a gun before a basketball
Son a cader, only one of them made it
Some agent lace my daddy's whiskey with some foreign agent
Collapsed he gasped out on the doctor's lap
Apartheid operations erased; dark the past
They tell me that don't rub it up the wrong way
These corridors of power filled with cowards playin' comrade
The worst master was the former slave
Before cats said it's war again,
The warrior was born again

I got good music on my radio (that's all I got)
You gave me freedom, I got a song you know
I can't match what you gave me, but I salute you ma
I love you

For whom the bell tolls, a four room hell hole
Bruises on the elbow
Contusions from the head blows
So was it Karl Marx or Sékou Touré
That made my mama fight
Yes and no, it really was the mess at home
My grandpapa drank, next door was a second home, 7 kids
But to the white man the kaffir boy
So granny got it all,
Beaten up & assaulted, treated like dog shit
The invisible victim of all this
It was not enough to sing a struggle song
Either alive or just surviving on
These guerrillas is up in arms
Born in Samarco, son of a soldier, Umkhonto
They taking pieces from the peace,
What you at war for
They tell me that don't rub you up the wrong way
When you can't tell the difference between enemies & comrades
And still my mama got the war face
I pray my daughters soften the pains, make warriors finally age

That's all I got ma I love you
I can't thank you enough
To think you were younger than me
When you decided to go fight, to sacrifice your life
For what you believe in