Fancy lyrics

I remember it all very well lookin` back it was the summer I turned eighteen

We lived in a oneroom rundown shack on the outskirts of New Orleans

We didn`t have money for food or rent to say the least we were hard pressed

Then mama spent every last penny we had to buy me a satin dancin` dress

Mama washed and combed and curled my hair and she painted my eyes and lips

Then I stepped into my satin dancin` dress

That had a split on the side clean up to my hips

It was red velvet trim and it fit me good and starin` back from the lookin` glass

There stood a woman where a half grown kid had stood

Here`s your one chance Fancy don`t let me down

Here`s your one chance Fancy don`t let me down



Mama dabbed a little bit of perfume on my neck and she kissed my cheek

Then I saw the tears wellin` up in her troubled eyes when she started to speak

She looked at a pitful shack and then she looked at me and took a ragged breath

Your pa`s run off and I`m real sick and the baby`s gonna starve to death

She handed me a heart shaped locket that said to thine owenself be true

And I shivered as I watched a rouch crawl across the toe of my high heeled shoe

It sounded like somebody else that was talkin` askin` mama what do I do

Just be nice to the gentlemen Fancy and they`ll be nice to you

Here`s your one chance...



Lord forgive me for what I do but if you want out well it`s up to you

Now don`t let me down you better start movin` uptown

Well that was the last time I saw my ma the night I left that rickety shack

The welfare people came and took the baby mama died and I ain`t been back

But the wheels of fate had started to turn and for me there was no way out

And it wasn`t very long till I knew exactly what my mama`d been talkin` about

I knew what I had to do but I made myself this solemn vow

That I was gonna be a lady someday though I didn`t know when or how

I couldn`t see spendin` the rest of my life with my head hung down in shame

I might have been born just plain white trash but Fancy was my name

Here`s your one chance...



It wasn`t long after a benevolent man took me off the street

And one week later I was pourin` his tea in a five room motel suite

I charmed a king a congressman and an occasional aristocrat

Then I got me a Georgia mansion in an elegant New York townhouse flat

And I ain`t done bad