Rain Effect

By Mary Ruefle b. 1952 Mary Ruefle

A bride and a groom sitting in an open buggy

in the rain, holding hands but not looking

at each other, waiting for the rain to stop,

waiting for the marriage to begin, embarrassed

by the rain, the effect of the rain on the bridal

veil, the wet horse with his mane in his eyes,

the rain cold as the sea, the sea deep as love,

big drops of rain falling on the leather seat,

the rain beaded on a rose pinned to the groom’s

lapel, the rain on the bride’s bouquet,

on the baby’s breath there, the sound of the rain

hitting the driver’s top hat, the rain

shining like satin on the black street,

on the tips of patent leather shoes, Hokusai’s

father who polished mirrors for a living, Hokusai’s

father watching the sky for clouds, Hokusai’s father’s son

drawing rain over a bridge and over the people crossing

the bridge, Hokusai’s father’s son drawing the rain

for hours, Hokusai’s father rubbing a mirror, the rain

cold as the sea, the sea cold as love, the sea swelling

to a tidal wave, at the tip of the wave white.

Source: Cold Pluto (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 1996)

Biography

Though poet and essayist Mary Ruefle was born outside Pittsburgh, she spent her youth moving around the United States and Europe with her military family.

She has written numerous books of poetry, including Indeed I Was Pleased with the World (2007) and The Adamant (1989), which won the Iowa Poetry Prize. A Little White Shadow (2006), her book of erasures—found texts in which all but a few words have been erased from the . . .

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