Gil Scott-Heron - Don't Give Up lyrics

Ahh lovely day…… I never really thought of myself as a complex man Or as someone who was really that hard to understand But it would hardly take a genius to realize That I've always been a lot too arrogant and a little too f$%kin' wise That was a combination that made folks feel duty bound To do whatever they could to try and shoot me down To head off some of the things I might possibly say And see if they couldn't take some of my pride away To bring me disappointment and teach me to fear it Obviously these are folks that just didn't have no spirit Spirits say [Chorus] Don't give up (spirits say don't give up) Yes it's time to stop your fallin' You've been down long enough Can't you hear the spirits callin' Yes it's the spirits Can't you hear iiiiiit Callin' your name x 2 Yeah talkin' bout spiriiiiiiiiiiits heh There are people whose lives are so far of the track That what they like best about life is stabbing' brothers in the back And I was obviously too blind and probably too weak To see who was responsible for my losing streak The best way to explain it is to say simply because I was looking around outside and the truth is I was The one. So I got locked into all of the an*lysis And found myself locked into a kind of paralysis And something was calling and I almost didn't hear it But I spent a lot of time being blessed by the spirits They keep saying [Chorus] I didn't matter if it was a child or and adult There was absolutely no-one that I could not insult So that I could isolate myself somewhere off to the side And continue to juggle all the possible whys The warmth I wanted to generate so well Had turned into a frozen hell And the discouraging injustices I felt Had pinned me somewhere inside a drug infested cell Where those who told didn't know and those who knew didn't tell And "I could continue to feel sorry for my self" [echo of ""] And then I heard [Chorus] Ain't no way overnight to turn your life around And this ain't the conversation of someone that never falls back down But no matter how long you've been on trial With the days and weeks of self denial And no matter how many times you've tried to make it And found out that right then you just couldn't take it If you are looking for a looser who found strength and success Remember the spirit of Brother Malcolm X And know that you can leave all your mistakes behind The day that you "really make up your mind" [echo of ""] Come on brother… come on up Stand on up and say… [Chorus]