Yellow Brick Road
[Intro]
If we want tomorrow to feel less harsh, we have to show up early—while people are still young enough to be steadied, taught, and protected.
Not with speeches. Not with slogans. With real choices that keep kids from being dismissed, ignored, or treated like they don’t matter.
The world feels loud right now. Everyone’s tense. We keep saying the next generation will do better—so we should build a world where “better” is actually possible.
[Verse 1]
Okay. I’ll be straight about it.
I’m pulling open the old cabinet, taking out the dusty parts, and naming what shaped me.
People judge the sound before the story. They judge the mood before the meaning. They decide what you are before they hear who you’ve been.
So let me roll it back—to being a kid, to the moment I noticed the world splitting people into boxes.
One side of the city. A thin line. A different air on the other side.
Crossing 8 Mile felt like stepping into a new rulebook.
No fireworks, no dramatic scene—just the subtle change in how strangers measure you.
I learned quickly: sometimes you’re invited, and sometimes you’re only allowed to stand nearby.
You hear it in the little laughs. You catch it in the pauses. You feel it when a room gets quiet for no reason.
Wherever I stood, someone could find a way to make me feel out of place.
One day it was a mall—nothing special, just me walking in—
and suddenly I’m aware I’m being tracked like I’m trouble.
On one side, I’m “not from here.” On the other side, I’m still “not from here.”
But every so often, a door didn’t slam.
Call it luck. Call it a break. Call it someone looking away for a second.
I call it moving anyway—because standing still felt like getting erased.
I remember cutting across a patch of grass and stepping over old railroad tracks—
tracks everyone recognizes, tracks that don’t care what name you carry.
Steel, gravel, and repetition.
But to me, those rails were a border.
And every crossing came with the same quiet promise: keep going.
[Chorus]
So come with me—walk the yellow-brick road.
Not to a fairytale, not to a throne—just back through the places that built me.
Walk with me through a small slice of life I once called “home,” even when it didn’t always feel safe.
Come on—walk the yellow-brick road.
Another page, another pass down the same streets.
Because sometimes the only way forward is to look back and name it clearly.
[Bridge]
I wandered so much people tried to make that my label.
Some days I’d lift a hand at the curb and hope a stranger would stop.
Other days I’d borrow a bike that wasn’t mine—ride fast, return quiet, act like it never happened.
I kept a map in my head: main roads, side cuts, and the park as the halfway point.
Then the long walk after dark—because night makes you less visible.
I’d slip into a house like a shadow, trying not to wake the world.
Especially when I’d been pushed out again, especially when home felt temporary.
Around then I met someone with energy like a spark—confidence worn like a jacket.
Another friend was there too, always smiling, always making the heavy parts lighter.
They were handing out flyers, talking up a school show, daring anyone to pay attention.
We weren’t famous. We weren’t polished. We just wanted a place to breathe.
I said, “Come through.” Like it was normal. Like it wasn’t risky to hope.
Someone looked at me like I’d lost my mind.
Then came the line—the familiar one meant to shrink you down.
So I did what I could do: I answered with rhythm.
Not perfect. Not legendary. Just enough to earn my spot in the room.
And oddly, our patterns lined up.
Same bounce, same timing—different lives, same hunger to be heard.
From then on, it wasn’t “me versus you.”
It became “we.”
And we both felt it—somewhere down the line, we’d meet again.
[Chorus]
So come with me—walk the yellow-brick road.
Not to escape, not to pretend—just to remember how a person gets built.
Walk with me through that small, complicated place I once called “home,”
and watch how the story keeps moving.
Come on—walk the yellow-brick road.
Another page, another pass down the same streets.
Because sometimes the only way forward is to look back and tell it clean.
