Corner Store Prophecy

Verse

Bell above the door still ring the same three notes

Duval kept a ledger taped up where the register floats

Sharpie names in columns, red line through the paid

Blue chalk for the ones still owing on the trade

I was eight cents short for milk when my mama's check ran late

He wrote my name in blue ink, said come back Friday, wait

Penny jar by the counter, take one, leave one, share

Rules older than the block, hung heavy in the air

Pre-Chorus

Wonder what it means when your name gets crossed in red

Wonder if the tally's just a story that gets read

Every kid on that wall either living it or dead

Chorus

Corner store prophecy, written in Sharpie ink

Tell you who gon' make it 'fore you get the chance to think

Corner store prophecy, credit or the door

That's the only fortune that the block ever swore

Verse

Fifteen years later I walked back through that same bell

Duval's hands shaking now but he remembers me well

Points to a faded name still owing on the wall

Says that boy made captain, paid it back last fall

Points to another, ink gone dark, never got erased

Says the streets took that one 'fore he found his own pace

I asked him why he kept it, why he don't just wipe it clean

He said the debt ain't money, boy, it's proof of what we've seen

Pre-Chorus

Wonder what it means when your name gets crossed in red

Wonder if the tally's just a story that gets read

Every kid on that wall either living it or dead

Chorus

Corner store prophecy, written in Sharpie ink

Tell you who gon' make it 'fore you get the chance to think

Corner store prophecy, credit or the door

That's the only fortune that the block ever swore

Bridge

Now I keep a list of my own, taped inside my coat

Names of everybody who kept me afloat

Not for what they owe me, for what they gave for free

Figured that's the only prophecy I need to see

Duval's gone gray, still marking up that wall

Says the ink don't judge you, it just remembers all

Chorus

Corner store prophecy, written in Sharpie ink

Tell you who gon' make it 'fore you get the chance to think

Corner store prophecy, credit or the door

That's the only fortune that the block ever swore