I traded in my Nike’s for the open mics 

Those early Saturday morning 6 o'clocks for them 7s ate my priorities I had to trade them in for 

The late nights of me scribbling cornfields on that cheddar cheese notebook paper. 

Sewing my seeds into similes my means into melodies my flow into the 7 seas splashing threes with these triple entendres, what you know?

The real meaning behind 23 went from jumpman to metaphysics.

I met a physics professor who taught his class using nothing but metaphors but of course, my undivided attention was in between the lines of my notebook paper.

Scribbling my life away as it passed me by he passed by me and said “boy you gonna be a poet.

You probably don't even know it but gravity just can't seem to keep your pen off that paper. 

But what you need to realize is the masses need your prowess they need to witness the light as it peaks over the horizon of an ocean of grey matter.

You've got to take matters into your own hands and understand that your purpose is purposeful and can only be fulfilled when your pen is filled with integrity.

Because Jesus is going to make another visit one day and as he walks across the Mississippi River eyes locked into yours, the last thing he's going to be worried about is the soles that are on your feet.”

Then he snapped on me and said “Boy are you listening?

Hearing is physical but listening is ethereal! 

That flick of your wrist is meant to splatter ink across canvases made of composition notebooks.

See kids these days don't like to read and

although it's no fault of theirs they find it much easier to see a message on a television screen than to simply hear out of their bedroom windows to the message of their communities, 

so your pen must speak more volumes than encyclopedia audio books, 

and it's stroke must be intentional!”

He told me “You've got to look into the mirror past your toothpaste splattered ego and see the prophet that you've been chosen to be!

There's a lot of space in your shoes for you to fill young man but all that is is a measure of your growth that of which is north of you so

take a step forward toward the celestial shores and allow your pen to breaststroke itself across a sea of A-B-Cs and plant these vocabulary trees so their seeds will fall back to earth and re-root themselves.”

I told him he was asking for a lot out of me and I asked him “what the hell makes you think you know me so well?”

He told me that back in '93 the real meaning behind 23 went from jumpman to metaphysics and that he once met a physics professor who taught his class using nothing but metaphors but  of course his undivided attention was in between the lines of his notebook paper.