Double Rainbow

By James Galvin b. 1951 James Galvin

Well aren't you the harsh necessity,

As in what fear is for?

It was the summer of

You should have been there,

Though the last thing I want

Anywhere near me is you.

Louche and thaumaturgic,

You made my faith

My foolishness—

Easy as lying to trees.

Essence of the inessential

Is what you are, double rainbow,

Extrinsic as blood is to stars,

An empire not of death,

But inspired by death,

Farrago of arid precepts,

A few cheap ideas about hope,

The eschaton, alterity,

All featuring you.

What are the chances?

Slim to none.

But listen here, my fraud, my forger,

I could close my eyes at any time.

All I have to do is close my eyes.

James Galvin, "Double Rainbow" from X Poems. Copyright © 2003 by James Galvin. Reprinted with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townshend, WA 98368-0271, coppercanyonpress.org.

Source: X poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2003)

Biography

James Galvin is the author of several collections of poetry, including Resurrection Update: Collected Poems, 1975–1997 and X (2003); a novel, Fencing the Sky (1999); and The Meadow (1992), a prose meditation on the landscape of the Wyoming-Colorado border and the people who live there.

Galvin’s work is infused with the genuine realities of the western landscape, while at the same time not shirking difficult questions of faith, . . .

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