(One, two...one, two)
Uh, yo
Body hurtin, seen a world still turning
A witch that wouldn't burn, to be brown and to be woman
To be permanently stuck in the skin of a sinnner
Like bitter cinnamon and broken mahogany splinters
My role is holy and my mother is too
Is it because I'm magic that my veins are not blue?
Sisters and hoes know the woes is the same
If you, you found me slain, would you still say my name?
See, I know about the black man and what he been through
What about if I sung about the woman that he brought it home to?
I been crying for my brothers, but I cry for me, too
Cause I'm the only one left to be more powerless than you
Even though it was she who taught the son to get melodical
I'm plenty blended but don't call me exotical
Like I was half black and half beautiful
It's so methodical I find it diabolical
All encrypted in a code, it's biological
You stripped the pride that is rising in my follicles
But these curves are not a caricature for your capitalizing
Don't decolonize me
As a westerner metropolis, yes
Down to money, Mississippi all the way to the west
I feel my back is breaking and they yanking my chest
The fruit is getting stranger and the streets never rest
But this is for you, Sarah Baartman
You were art to these marksmen
Show you in the town square, put you up to buy
And with your wildest cries I identified
See, I been on display like items for their eyes
And I tried to board a midnight train
I said I have no money but I have a lot of pain
All I wanted was to leave my father's house, make it out
But every time I sing they remind me of disdain
And I wonder who's gonna know, who's gonna hold her
The last of left out, lost and looked over
The songs of [...] only rain on some
And it's man's world, the change gon come
Uh, yo
Body hurtin, seen a world still turning
A witch that wouldn't burn, to be brown and to be woman
To be permanently stuck in the skin of a sinnner
Like bitter cinnamon and broken mahogany splinters
My role is holy and my mother is too
Is it because I'm magic that my veins are not blue?
Sisters and hoes know the woes is the same
If you, you found me slain, would you still say my name?
See, I know about the black man and what he been through
What about if I sung about the woman that he brought it home to?
I been crying for my brothers, but I cry for me, too
Cause I'm the only one left to be more powerless than you
Even though it was she who taught the son to get melodical
I'm plenty blended but don't call me exotical
Like I was half black and half beautiful
It's so methodical I find it diabolical
All encrypted in a code, it's biological
You stripped the pride that is rising in my follicles
But these curves are not a caricature for your capitalizing
Don't decolonize me
As a westerner metropolis, yes
Down to money, Mississippi all the way to the west
I feel my back is breaking and they yanking my chest
The fruit is getting stranger and the streets never rest
But this is for you, Sarah Baartman
You were art to these marksmen
Show you in the town square, put you up to buy
And with your wildest cries I identified
See, I been on display like items for their eyes
And I tried to board a midnight train
I said I have no money but I have a lot of pain
All I wanted was to leave my father's house, make it out
But every time I sing they remind me of disdain
And I wonder who's gonna know, who's gonna hold her
The last of left out, lost and looked over
The songs of [...] only rain on some
And it's man's world, the change gon come
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Album: Creature
Sarah Baartman era una donna africana dell'etnia Khoikhoi che fu esibite nel Freak Show nel XIX secolo in Europa sotto il nome di Venere ottentotta.
Saartjie Baartman nacque nel 1789 da una famiglia di etnia khoikhoi, nelle vicinanze del fiume Gamtoos nell'odierno Sudafrica. Rimase orfana a causa di un raid di un commando sudafricano. Saartjie, pronunciato "Sahr-ki", è la forma Afrikaans del suo nome; sta per "piccola Sara", in cui il diminutivo era probabilmente dovuto alla sua bassa statura (era alta 1 metro e 35 centimetri), e le fu assegnato dalla famiglia di boeri di Città del Capo presso cui lavorò come schiava. Il suo nome di nascita è sconosciuto.
Hendrick Cezar, il fratello del suo proprietario, suggerì di portarla in Inghilterra come fenomeno da baraccone, promettendole un sicuro benessere. Saartjie fu trasferita a Londra nel 1810.
Baartman fu esibita in tutta l'Inghilterra, dove intratteneva la gente esponendo le sue natiche nude e le sue piccole labbra, mostrando agli europei le fattezze, per loro inusuali, del suo corpo. Aveva infatti natiche enormi (steatopigia) e le labbra della sua vagina sporgevano per oltre 8 centimetri (macroninfia), come accade sovente presso le donne Khoisan. Quest'ultimo tratto (definito "grembiule ottentotto"), tuttavia, non fu mai esibito dalla donna, che lo copriva con un straccio, mentre, legata alla catena, camminava a quattro zampe in maniera animalesca.