shhh! the baby’s sleeping

Evil Nine – Crooked (feat Aesop Rock)
from You Can Be Special Too (2004) /break-hop/

we don’t like it when the city lights start fading
when the city people act crooked
when the city pigeons break wings
when the city fire starts spreading
then we can’t get down!

Hey. The sky would be burning with fire, but it’s since burnt out and the embers have dulled to grey. You smell that? Heady and sweet mixed with sulphur. You want to reach out and touch it, knowing it will sting through your skin, and cut into your core. Lucky you can’t touch a smell, anyway. That creeping yellow mist, though, you can touch, maybe even hold; not that you’d want to try. There’s voices everywhere, left and right, seeping up through cracked asphalt. Black shadows; darkened stark, through the chill mist, even against the black building piles. They creep in a crooked circle around you, twenty, maybe twenty seven of them. Just shadows, but helmeted, moving under heavy weight. Shapes of letters and numbers in their hands. Too dark to read. 9mm. MP5. AK-47. M16. There’s an avenue of escape behind your left shoulder, and then there isn’t. You turn 360. The noose is closed. Your turning stomach is a crank, winding your sinking heart into your mouth. The shadows are still, for about 15 more seconds, then they raise their arms toward you. And start to dance.