"Fast car" is kind of a continuation of Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." It has all the clawing your way to a better life, but in this case the protagonist never makes it with her love; in fact she is dragged back down by him.
There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
My mother loved it so she said
Sad eyed pearl and drop lips
Glancing pierce through writer man
Spoke hushed and frailing hips
Her old eyes skim in creasing lids
A tear falls as she describes
Approaching death with a yearning heart
With pride and no despise
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
Just wise owl tones no velvet lies
Crush her velvet call
Oh Marlene suffer all the fools
Who write you on the wall
And hold your tongue about your life
Or dead hands will change the plot
Will make your loving sound like snakes
Like you were never hot
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
My mother loved it so she said
Sad eyed pearl and drop lips yeah
Glancing pierce through writer man
Spoke hushed and frailing lips yeah
Old eyes skim in creasing lids
A tear falls as she describes
Approaching death with a yearning heart
With pride and no despise
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
Sad eyed pearl and drop lips
Glancing pierce through writer man
Spoke hushed and frailing hips
Her old eyes skim in creasing lids
A tear falls as she describes
Approaching death with a yearning heart
With pride and no despise
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
Just wise owl tones no velvet lies
Crush her velvet call
Oh Marlene suffer all the fools
Who write you on the wall
And hold your tongue about your life
Or dead hands will change the plot
Will make your loving sound like snakes
Like you were never hot
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
My mother loved it so she said
Sad eyed pearl and drop lips yeah
Glancing pierce through writer man
Spoke hushed and frailing lips yeah
Old eyes skim in creasing lids
A tear falls as she describes
Approaching death with a yearning heart
With pride and no despise
Hot tears flow as she recounts
Her favorite worded token
Forgive me please for hurting so
Don't go away heartbroken no
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Fast Car
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The chorus offers a glimmer of optimism and a chance at a resolution and redemption in the future.
Captures the rollercoaster of emotions of feeling lost while loving someone who is not there for you, feeling let down and abandoned while waiting for a lover. Lost with no direction, "Now I'm up in the air with the rain in my hair, Nowhere to go, I can go anywhere"
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Marlene Dietrich was a diva, who's personal life was kept out of the public view. ("hold your tongue about your life") had many lovers, among them famous writers ("writer man"). There's also a reference to Dietrich's singing style: "Just wise owl tones - no velvet lies crush her velvet call" - who sounded bitterly-"sober", and disenchanted. The song describes someone (Marlene?, or the writer's mother?) on her death-bed, remembering a "token" - either used on her, or one that she used (Perhaps a line from one of Dietrich's songs, or a poem she loved?) - "Forgive me please, for hurting (you) so, don't go away heartbroken". "the fools who write you on the wall" might refer to ownership in love, either read literally as: To try to own in love is a foolish thing, or ironicly: What a fool was I to give you my heart.