| Well, all I’ve ever known is poor
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| Owe my skin to the country store
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| Owns my walls, my roof, my door
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| But he tells me I’m free
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| But I fight the will to live
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| Hell might take but heaven gives
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| It’s the only one so I’ll forgive
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| And I ain’t the one to grieve
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| And the summer day make a white man lazy
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| He sits on his porch killing time
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| I gotta work to feed my wife and baby
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| I work so god damn hard that it’s a crime
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| Well, I went down to the polling place
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| The white men there just laughed in my face
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| Saying boy, this ain’t no nigga’s race
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| You best get on your way
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| Sir, I believe I’ve got the right
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| Said you ain’t got nothing if you ain’t white
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| And I thought I said get out of sight
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| Well, what was I to say?
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| And the summer day make a white man lazy
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| He sits on his porch killing time
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| I gotta work to feed my wife and baby
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| I work so god damn hard that it’s a crime
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| When I was 'bout the age of five
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| Watched my daddy burned alive
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| They cut him low and they hung him high
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| Swayin' in the breeze
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| The last words I heard him say
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| Before they stole his life that day
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| Was forgive them lord, they gone astray
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| Now take me to my ease
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| And the summer day make a white man lazy
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| He sits on his porch killing time
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| But the summer day make a nigga feel crazy
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| Might make me do something out of line
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| Well, I dont know but I heard tell
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| Of a furnace below a place called hell
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| And who would catch me if I fell?
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| Who would pray for me?
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| But one thing I see for sure
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| It’s hot as hell up here I know
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| And the devil lives right down the road
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| It’s all the same to me
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| And a summer day make a white man feel lazy
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| He sits on his porch killing time
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| But the summer day make a nigga feel crazy
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| Might make me do something out of line
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| But if you should see my wife
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| Tell her that I won’t be home tonight
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| So dont leave on the light
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| I got a little buisness down the road
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| And If I’m dead by sunrise
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| Kiss my baby girl for me
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| It ain’t life if it ain’t free
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| I’ve got a mighty burden to unload |