Reply #44: Don also wrote a great song about poverty . . . [View All]

[OneBlueSky]

many years ago, Don was part of an outdoor concert I helped produce . . . his song "Orphans of Wealth" was brand new, and he was singing it in public for the first time . . . it had been overcast all night, with a threat of rain . . . just as he began his last chorus ("And the rain falls and blows through their window"), the thunder started, and just as he sang the last line, the skies opened up with a torrential storm . . . the show was filmed by public television for later broadcast, and it was a truly dramatic moment that they captured beautifully . . . great ending to a great song . . .

Orphans of Wealth
by Don McLean

There is no time to discuss or debate
what is right, what is wrong for our people.
Time has run out for all those who wait
with bent limbs and minds that are feeble.

And the rain falls and blows through their window
and the snow falls and blows through their door.
And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation.
When the tides rise, they cover the floor.

They come from the north and they come from the south
and they come from the hills and the valleys.
And they're migrants and farmers and miners and humans,
our census neglected to tally.

And the rain falls and blows through their window
and the rain falls and it blows through their door.
And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation.
When the tides rise, they cover the floor.

And they´re African, Mexican, Caucasian, Indian,
hungry and hopeless Americans.
The orphans of wealth and of adequate health,
disowned by this nation they live in.

And with weather worn hands on bread lines they stand,
yet but one more degradation.
And they're treated like tramps while we sell them food stamps
this thriving and prosperous nation.

And the rain falls and blows through their window
and the snow falls and blows through their door.
And the seasons revolve mid their sounds of starvation.
When the tides rise, they cover the floor.

And with roaches and rickets and rats in the thickets,
infested, diseased and decaying.
With rags and no shoes and skin sores that ooze,
by the poisonous pools, they are playing.

In shacks of two rooms that are rotting wood tombs
with corpses breathing inside them.
And we pity their plight as they call in the night
and we do all that we can do to hide them.

And the rain falls and blows through their window
and the snow falls in white drifts that fold
and the tides rise with floods in the nursery.
And a child is crying, he's hungry and cold,
his life has been sold, his young face looks old.
It's the face of America, dying.