Eminent Domain

[Verse 1]
October twentieth, three forty-seven, the back house in Inglewood,
the tumblers in the deadbolt click like the plan was misunderstood.
Just a civic hearing, you were loudly interfering,
with a public works project my sister’s future was steering.
I read the fine print, the lines on your face a clear notice,
you were rezoning the family, the act itself was your coldest.
So I drafted new permits, a necessary erasure,
for a foundational rot that no love could ever brace for.

[Chorus]
This is eminent domain.
A compulsory purchase on the memory of the rain.
It’s just infrastructure.
It's not personal.

[Verse 2]
Now there's a vacant lot where the porch light used to be burning,
a silence so heavy you can feel the whole earth turning.
I burn the old blueprints, the Creole scrawled on the pages,
my inheritance is just a grid of empty cages.
Heard you on the phone, the static screamed “you can’t just cut me out,”
like a protestor chained to a landmark they care about.
But the wrecking ball swings, man, I'm just following procedure,
this new high-rise blocks the sun, that’s just a minor feature.

[Bridge]
I still keep the skeleton key in a box under the floorboards.
It doesn’t open anything anymore.

[Outro]
It's just infrastructure.
Just business.