Ebony Revisited (Unplugged)

It's 6 am again, I get up for a run Through urban environs street life's barely begun No one's hanging out on corners or boozing on their porch 'Cept Uncle John with his moonshine and patent pendin' torch I pass McKinley High School and Piney Branch Hill Heading t'wards the people's Park Powered by adrenaline A runner scuttles by me Now and then a bike or two As I cross Devil's Footbridge Beneath me smells of dew Yes I was born here but that don't make it home 1-202 ain't local on my cellphone It's not my home I'm just a stranger passing through It's not my home Though I love how you do you Maybe someday I'll return Pay you back for all I learned It's Ebony Revisited But Lord it's not my home My mama and her kinfolk came by colored-only bus My daddy got here later, invited by a campus Some call it Chocolate City; other's say it's woke But just like John Sayles' "Brother" I don't always get the joke You see my family left here when I was four years old By seven my grandparents were resting under tombstones Soon enough thereafter we moved to distant shores It's sho' hard to know your birthplace from an alien port Yes I was born here but that don't make it home 1-202 ain't local on my cellphone It's not my home I'm just a stranger passing through It's not my home Though I love how you do you Maybe someday I'll return Pay you back for all I learned It's Ebony Revisited But Lord it's not my home It's not home Home, home, home