When we gamble with our time we choose our destiny.

"From honor roll to cracking bikes up off them bicycle racks/.../And them eyes where he hiding all them icicles at" - Earl Sweatshirt, Chum

"Hated for bank lifting and spraying then hide away in the shade of his maimed innocence"- Earl Sweatshirt, Whoa

What do we notice?

-referring to self in 3rd person. (Is Earl 'him'/'he'? Refers to self in 1st person in other lines)
-robbery (stealing bikes, lifting banks)
-Hiding. (he hides in his maimed innocence and the icicles hide in his eyes)

What do we take away?

Well, it seems like Earl is observing and describing the various contradictory layers of himself.

Based on his actions (stealing, robbing), he's a bad, troubled dude. But after doing these things he hides in the shade of his maimed innocence. He still appears young and innocent. He looks way too young to be experiencing all of these problems and it might allow him to get away with these things while also further harming himself.

But then, hidden within that hidden-ness are the icicles in his eyes. If you really looked at Earl--looked him in the eyes--you'd see all the bitterness and anger. And in the third person, Earl is looking at himself with that iciness.

He's really hard on himself. The whole song, Chum, is detailing how he turned the pain of his father leaving him into hard drinking and rapping. By the end of the song he says 'I already feel like calling it quits."

But I don't think Earl is pitying himself or making himself out to be a tragic figure. As he says in the chorus, "Get up off the pavement, brush the dirt up off my psyche...psyche...psyche."

He's picking himself up and brushing himself off. He knows he's not perfect. He knows he's been way down before and stepped on by circumstance and people close to him. Rapping is an outlet for his pain. But it can also cause more pain. But it's also, unlike his real life, a place where doesn't have to hide--a place where he can talk about the hiding he does.

He's Earl Sweatshirt. Through words, his identity is exactly what he constructs it to be. When he raps, he's not this mixed up person who looks too young or too white or too black and has to hide, he's honest.