Stuart Miller-Osborne

This is a strange beach as it is so benign Yet the notice warns us not to swim I believe it is because of the tides It is said that dark currents are present This is such a nice beach Do you know that the poet Antonio lived here In the years between the wars…

We were staying in a small hotel Hotel Alicia Roja It is in the centre of the town Not far from the museum Neither of us had planned To break our journey But thought it wise To rest for a day I am sitting by an opal window Staring into the afternoon sky A haze…

Las Palmeras de Rosa This is where my parents met Neither should have been there My mother was fruit picking My father was a chauffeur His employers often visited Spain My mother was Welsh And was just travelling As we are at present They met and shared a drink Exchanged names And eighteen month later…

We were in Coach D opposite the Rest Room sign Our train had stopped at a station named Lima I could see a signal at danger from my pale blue seat Eve was purchasing a soda from a vending machine outside

We changed trains earlier today The station was busy and very hot I found a small bookstall on the fourth platform And purchased a book of poems By a girl named Julie B The poems in no particular order were a la recherche d’une relation sérieuse Touching the Scriptures Del Mare The Monsoon Club Do…

The stationmaster later told them As they waited for another train That these birds were the souls of villagers Returning to their former coastal homes

In the week that they spent at the campsite They both noticed a number of white birds That did not seem to belong to the sea And then these birds vanished As quickly as they first appeared

The idea that reality Is an illusion Does not mean That nothing exists I am sitting in front Of our travelling tent The air is warm We have views Across the bay The sun is setting Its theatre is immense Is my happiness Nothing but an illusion Or is it real

Happiness Is the proof Of my existence Without happiness The world is a fallow field

I do not know What made me So happy The long sandy beach The Sea The Sun Our wonderful swim Or seeing you fully naked For the first time Since we met