Lyrics I Was Zero - Sage Francis

If it wasn't for the bass
I wouldn't need these hearing aids
If it wasn't for mistakes
I probably wouldn't be here today

10 years ago I was 22
20 years ago I was 12
30 years ago I was 2
But when I came out, my momma, I was zero

When I came out, my momma, I was zero
When I came out, my momma, I was zero
I was zero when I came out, my momma
Now everybody knows

In the before life, I was undead
I was home schooled, there were no rules
But I gave it all up, just for the chance to go public
A celestial scarecrow dancing with the puppets

A tug in my gut, I'm carrying the world in my stomach
I'm a surrogate mother-fucker, the girls love it
Birth the suffix and cut the visible string
Control's much more than a physical thing

I was born into it and before I knew it
I saw the students of poor getting hauled off to war
The law of Judas in the land of the king's tax
Partake in the Eucharist and then demand your kick-backs

Spiritual wrist slap, please, pass the sacrament
Ask if, big, bad, black Jesus was African
Selling a click track, call it a soul-plat
It's all in how you package it
The power of a magic trick

Immaculate concepts, lost in the land of the cross
I'm standing off with a man of the cloth
He knows the ins and outs, all I want is the outs
He's selling real estate for some place in the clouds

But I'm not investing in intellectual property
Inventing gender-bending technology
'Cause maybe everybody needs to just become a sexual oddity
Leaving birth to the test tubes and death to the lottery

There's no one stopping me, I've gotta be self-regulating
Wealth is escalating but my poverty was entertaining
I'm debating, the value of a caste system
I'm cash backed for wars and wars funded by my tax income

I find my part of the problem in part of me
There's always been a difference between
What I am and what I wanna be

It's either Jihadist freak or Jesus seamster
I heard god is cumming and she's a screamer

I couldn't understand what she was telling me
Why everyone thinks that they're their own worst enemy
I followed the manual and I swallowed the skeleton key
And it unlocked the hell in me

So this is my gift to god
Ripping at my dick like a tourniquet, syphilis
This is my gift to god
I'm jumping out the cake, naked with a shank

This is my gift to god
Unwrap the package, confetti made of maggots
This is my gift
You call that talent?
Here's your image back, you can have it

Congratulations
This is very beautiful

10 years ago I was 22
20 years ago I was 12
30 years ago I was 2

When I came out, my momma, I was zero
When I came out, my momma, I was zero
When I came out, my momma, I was zero
When I came out, my momma, I was zero

I was zero when I came out, my momma
Now everybody knows
I was zero when I came out, my momma
Now everybody knows

Everybody knows
Everybody knows
Everybody knows
Everybody knows

Ins and outs, all I want is the outs
Ins and outs, all I want is the outs
Ins and outs, all I want is the outs
Ins and outs, all I want is the outs

Out, my momma, I was zero
Out, my momma, I was zero
Out, my momma, I was zero
Out, my momma, I was zero

If it wasn't for the bass
I wouldn't need these hearing aids
If it wasn't for mistakes
I probably wouldn't be here today

If it wasn't for the bass
I wouldn't need these hearing aids
If it wasn't for mistakes
I wouldn't be here today