Nas quotes

I never sleep, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death

We came to this country

We were kings and queens, never porch monkeys

There was empires in Africa called Kush

Timbuktu, where every race came to get books

Nas is like the Afrocentric Asian: half-man, half-amazin'

It's mine, it's mine, it's mine—whose world is this?

The world is yours, the world is yours

I would be Ivy League if America played fair

Poor excuse, and so I was

Life is parallel to Hell, but I must maintain

And be prosperous, though we live dangerous

My rhymin' is a vitamin held without a capsule

I think of crime when I'm in a New York State of Mind

Y'all niggas was born, I shot my way out my mom dukes

Somehow the rap game reminds me of the crack game

Used to sport Bally's and Cazals with black frames

Now I'm into fat chains, sex and TECs

Fly new chicks and new kicks, Heines and Beck's

I'm the young city bandit, hold myself down single-handed

For murder raps, I kick my thoughts alone, get remanded

Born alone, die alone, no crew to keep my crown or throne

So he moves with his peers, different blocks, different years

Sittin' on different benches like it's musical chairs

From the spliff that I lift and inhale; it ain't hard to tell

But don't say my car's topless, say "the titties is out"

I decipher prophecies through a mic and say, "Peace"

For real, a nickel-plate is my fate, my medicine is the ganja

True in the game, as long as blood is blue in my vein

I pour my Heineken brew to my deceased crew on memory lane

I rap for listeners, blunt heads, fly ladies and prisoners

What's up with tomorrow? Will you lead? Will you follow?

Improve your values, education is real power

I reach 'em like Bono, so get rid of your self sorrow

Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined

Street scriptures for lost souls in the crossroads

Systemic racism kills our spirit. It kills our drive. It kills our souls. It kills our dreams and it kills our body with bullets

I wish artists would try not to do so much clout because the people notice it and it’s corny.

Then it becomes a gimmick if every rap album you make is about how you came up in the hood.

It wasn't about anything other than, I want you to know who I am, what the streets taste like, feel like, smell like, what crackheads do. I wanted you to smell it, feel it.

Though incarcerated, your mind dive

I hate it when your moms cries

And any day could be your last in the jungle

Get murdered on a humble, guns'll blast, niggas tumble

I thought Jordans and a gold chain was livin' it up

Worst enemies wanna be my best friends

There's one life, one love, so there can only be one King

I'm out for dead presidents to represent me

A word best describin' my life to name my daughter

My strength, my son, the star will be my resurrection

Born in correction, all the wrong shit I did, he'll lead in right direction