Rainbow, properly speaking, should be called "after-rain" bow.
When I learned the Italian word "arcobaleno" the image that passed my mind was a pod of whales flying across the sky in a line. But it has nothing to do with "balena" (whale) but "baleno," meaning "lightning."
The Spanish "arco iris" is a radient phrase that retains rainbow's irrational iridescence.
The French "arc-en-ciel" is so matter-of-factly and Cartesian.
In Manoa where I went to graduate school, rainbows on the mauka side were always double and appeared every afternoon.
