In a post-apocalyptic future where humanity has been wiped out, a fully automated house miraculously survives, carrying out its daily routines as if nothing has changed, unaware that there is no one left to hear it. As nature slowly reclaims the world, the house recites Sara Teasdale’s haunting poem of the same name. Bradbury saw There Will Come Soft Rains as the story that best captured the essence of his writing and considered it the only true science fiction piece in The Martian Chronicles.