True story: an entire double rainbow has graced our sky
for the last two nights in a row. What a potent feeling,
to walk out into the street, light rain peppering my hair
(or what hair remains, anyway), tickling my scalp
I have my phone in hand, ready to take a picture,
maybe post it somewhere, Facetok, Instabook, Tikgram.  

And then I see what I am doing, and pause
I don’t need a phone to look at the sky
All I need are eyes. All I need is a heart
open to wonder, a mind open to beauty. A body
ready to receive this glory from above.

I remember teaching my daughter about rainbows
They danced and sang that day, literally: on our front porch
they celebrated this colorful perfect arc, wanting and needing
no more than the sight of a simple everyday miracle.
And I, because I am who I am, needed more, taught them
the reason for all this wonder, the science behind it,
the position of the sun and the rain, the exact
42 degrees needed between the rainbow and the eye.

I think back on that day my daughters danced and sang
proud of what I taught them, but worried that the science
got in the way, sandwiched between wisdom and wonder.
Did I impose limits on their joy, in the same way this camera
in my phone imposes limits on my own? Does my tech-addled
need to document a moment with a camera
when I see some simple everyday miracle
get in the way between me and the veil of clouds above me?

I lower my camera, raise my head to the sky
Dark stormy anvils of cloud lay behind me
piling against the peaks of the Rocky Mountains
like words, waiting to be written. The perfect geometric
double arc of a rainbow shines before me.  Beyond these veils:
the veil of science, the veil of clouds, the veil of technology, the veil of
familial love, lies a vision beyond real understanding. 

I try to resist the need to understand, and for a brief moment
I succeed. I release myself from cause and effect. I feel
the soft summer rain on my hair, as my eyes climb
the bridge of color between Earth and sky. I keep this
simple lesson in my heart. Don’t let things get in the way.

The geometry of rainbows describes the beauty, but is not
the beauty itself. Let nothing stand between you
and the object of your joy.  Remember instead your daughters’
rapt celebration as they danced and sang under an infinite roof,
woven from cloud and light, love and rainbows.