Coming of the Rain
By Rod McKuen


Where were we
when the coming of the rain
made us turn from conversation to the window?

In mustard fields maybe,
or the love jungle,
and as we talked
we were with others, not ourselves.

I was thinking of old birthdays and holidays gone wrong, pretty people seen on streetcars
but never met.
Selling soda bottles to pay for movie matinees.
I was twelve.
Tarzan was the man I most resembled in those days.
How can I have grown so old without once swinging on a vine?
Did you think of party dresses
and high school plays
or hallways full of lovers not yet met?

The mind is such a junkyard;
it remembers candy bars
but not the Gettysburg Address,
Frank Sinatra’s middle name
but not the day your best friend died.

If in your mind there is some corner
not yet occupied with numbers
you may never need,
remind your memory of the day
we turned to watch the rain
and turning back forgot
that we belonged to one another.

From the book & album Listen to the Warm, 1967.
Words & Music by Rod McKuen. © 1967 by Rod McKuen
& The Stanyan Music Group. Copyright renewed.
Reprinted by permission.