Early Morning Rain

The one song I sing more than any other is "Early Morning Rain." It's a Gordon Lightfoot song, but I first heard it decades ago by Peter, Paul, and Mary. I have loved it ever since I was a child. I don't know if I understood the song back then, but the haunting melody, and the lyrics just tender enough to evoke reality, have stayed with me through the years...

I've played the song a thousand ways, from country to R & B, and even its original folk-rock version...I've played it in a couple of different keys as my voice has changed over the years...I've fiddled with the lyrics as the Spirit has moved me...and I still love that song.

I guess it is my favorite song, although Van Morrison's "Tupelo Honey" is what I always say when someone asks me that question...but I live with the early morning rain...I live with the dreams that haven't made it yet...with the people who have left, and whom I have left...but with no regrets...no sense of despair or frustration...just the calm accceptance that rain comes....

I know I didn't know much about that when I first learned the song...but forty years later...? Well, that's about the only thing I have learned...and the song is not a song of anger, but rather of a patient and enduring hope that arises from a dead guy who arose from the dead...I could write all day about this guy, about the love God promised me in his death and resurrection...but I won't...I'd best be on my way--in the early morning rain.