Subjects · · 8 min read
The Rainbow Bridge Poem: Where It Came From
The Rainbow Bridge poem was anonymous for over 60 years. Here is who actually wrote it, when, what it says, and why it still helps grieving pet owners.
By Thomas Mark
Last updated: September 2026
The Rainbow Bridge poem
Quick answer: The Rainbow Bridge poem is a short prose poem about pets waiting in a green meadow until their person arrives, and then crossing over together. It circulated anonymously for decades, and for most of that time it was assumed to be American and written in the early 1980s. In 2023 it was traced to Edna Clyne-Rekhy, a Scottish artist who wrote it in 1959 near Inverness, aged 19, the day after her Labrador Major died — more than twenty years earlier than anyone thought. She never signed it, never sold it, and only found out it had travelled the world when a researcher knocked on her door in her eighties. People often read it aloud when they scatter ashes, or hang it beside a painted memorial portrait, which starts at £220 and takes three to four weeks.
What the poem actually says
It is not really a poem in the metrical sense. It is about three hundred words of plain prose, and its first line is the part almost everyone can recite: "Just this side of Heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge."
The rest works like a very careful piece of reassurance, and each part answers a specific fear a grieving owner has:
- The animals are restored. Old dogs are young again, the blind can see, the ones who limped run properly. This answers did they die in pain.
- There is food, warmth and company. This answers are they frightened without me.
- They are happy, but not completely — something is missing. This answers have they forgotten me.
- Then one day one animal stops, looks into the distance, and breaks into a run, because you have arrived.
That last beat is the whole thing. Everything before it exists to set it up. It is why the poem lands even on people who do not believe a word of it: it is not making a claim about the afterlife so much as promising that the bond was mutual and that it did not end at the vet's table.
Who wrote the Rainbow Bridge poem
For sixty-four years, nobody knew. The text arrived at people second- or third-hand — pinned to a noticeboard at a vet's surgery, photocopied in a pet bereavement newsletter, forwarded in a chain email — and none of those copies carried a name.
In 2023 the art historian and researcher Paul Koudounaris tracked the trail back to Edna Clyne-Rekhy, then 82 and living in Scotland. She had written it in 1959, at nineteen, the morning after her Labrador Major died. She wrote it in one sitting on a notepad, showed it to a few friends, typed out copies for people who asked, and thought no more about it. She never put her name on any of them. She still had the handwritten original.
Her version differs in small ways from the text that spread — a few phrases smoothed out, some wording changed in the retyping — which is exactly what you would expect from something copied by hand across decades. She has said she had no idea it had escaped her circle of friends at all, let alone that it was being read at funerals on other continents. She wrote it about a dog, but the text itself never names a species — it says pets throughout, which is why it reads just as well for a cat, a horse or a rabbit.
Everyone who was credited before that
Because the poem was anonymous and clearly valuable, several people were named as the author over the years. Some of those claims were made in good faith by people who had genuinely written their own version of the legend; others were simply misattributions that stuck.
| Named as author | Claimed date | What they actually published | Where it stands now |
|---|---|---|---|
| Edna Clyne-Rekhy | 1959 | Nothing — she typed copies for friends and never signed them | Holds the handwritten original; identified in 2023 and now the accepted author |
| Paul C. Dahm | 1981 | Rainbow Bridge, a book published in 1998; he was a grief counsellor in Oregon | Credited for years, including in obituaries, but predated by 22 years |
| William N. Britton | 1994 | Legend of Rainbow Bridge, a published book with its own registered copyright | A separate, later retelling rather than the anonymous original |
| Wallace Sife | 1990s | Founded the Association for Pet Loss and Bereavement, which circulated the text widely | Distributed it; not the author |
The spread itself is easy enough to trace even without the authorship. It surfaced in pet bereavement newsletters and support groups through the late 1980s, was reprinted by American newspaper advice columns in the 1990s, and then moved onto mailing lists and early web forums, where an unsigned three-hundred-word text can copy itself indefinitely at no cost. By the time anyone thought to ask who wrote it, there were thousands of copies and no source.
Why a rainbow, and why a bridge
People often assume the image was lifted from Norse mythology, where Bifröst is the burning rainbow bridge between the human world and the realm of the gods. It is a fair connection to draw, and the resemblance is real. But Clyne-Rekhy's own account is more ordinary and, honestly, more affecting: she was nineteen, her dog had just died, and she reached for the brightest thing she could think of.
Both explanations point at the same instinct. A rainbow is temporary, appears after bad weather, and touches the ground at both ends. As a picture of what happens between a person and an animal they loved, that is hard to improve on.
Does it actually help?
Sometimes, and not always, and it is worth saying plainly that disliking it is allowed. A fair number of people find the poem too sweet, or find that the meadow imagery does nothing for them, and then feel guilty about that on top of everything else. Grief does not owe anybody a particular reaction.
What the poem does reliably well is give people permission. Pet loss is what bereavement researchers call disenfranchised grief — a real loss with no funeral, no time off, and no socially agreed script. A short text that everyone recognises acts as that missing script. It is why it gets read aloud at cremations, printed in order-of-service sheets, and quoted in cards by people who would otherwise have no idea what to write. If you are the one trying to find words for someone else, there is more on what to say when someone's pet dies.
What people do with it
The poem is usually the words half of something. The other half tends to be an object — a scattering spot, a bench, a piece of jewellery, or a picture on a wall. There is no rush to decide any of it, and quite a few people find they cannot face choosing photographs for months.
If a portrait is the direction you go in, sizes and prices for a hand-painted pet portrait work out like this:
| Size | Price | Where it usually goes |
|---|---|---|
| 12 × 16" | £220 | Shelf, bedside, small hallway — head-and-shoulders of one animal |
| 16 × 20" | £275 | The most common choice; reads properly from across a room |
| 20 × 24" | £330 | Above a fireplace or a chest of drawers; full body works at this size |
| 24 × 36" | £449 | A wall of its own, or two animals together |
| 30 × 40" | £489 | Large living-room wall, viewed from six feet or more |
| 36 × 48" | £549 | Statement piece — needs a big wall and distance to be seen properly |
Everything is painted in oil by hand and ships rolled in a tube, unframed, and takes three to four weeks plus delivery. You see a photograph of the finished painting and approve it before it ships — we keep painting until it is right, so nothing arrives as a surprise. Full prices and what is included are on the pricing page.
The photograph matters more than the size does. Daylight, eye level, and the animal's face in focus will beat a technically better camera every time — and if the only pictures you have are old phone snaps taken in a dark kitchen, that is usually still workable. There is guidance on choosing between the shots you have in the photo guides.
Frequently asked
Who wrote the Rainbow Bridge poem?
Edna Clyne-Rekhy, a Scottish artist, wrote it in 1959 after the death of her Labrador Major. She was identified as the author in 2023, having written it anonymously at nineteen and never claimed it.
When was the Rainbow Bridge poem written?
- It was not widely circulated until the late 1980s, which is why it was assumed for decades to be an American text from the early 1980s.
Is the Rainbow Bridge poem religious?
Not in any denominational sense. It mentions Heaven in the first line but has no doctrine, no god and no judgement in it, which is a large part of why it gets read at services of every kind and none.
Can I read it at my pet's cremation or print it on a card?
Reading it aloud at a private service or writing it in a card for a friend is entirely normal and nobody will object. Commercial reproduction is murkier, because several later retellings carry their own registered copyrights, so if you are selling something with the text on it, check whose version you have.
How long do I have to decide on a memorial?
As long as you want. Ashes keep indefinitely, photographs do not degrade on a phone, and a commission started next spring will be exactly the same painting as one started this week. If and when you are ready, a portrait from a photograph takes three to four weeks from the photo you send to the finished painting.