Postcard From Spain

When I went looking for a story I had written a few years back, I found this piece from 2003. My wonderful friend Nancy and I had gone to Spain to participate in a volunteer project studying Mediterranean dolphins, but the project got canceled that year and we ended with a number of extra weeks to just be tourists. We had a blast driving the backroads of Portugal and Spain and amused ourselves taking pictures and visiting out of season and unforgettable out of the way places. The Costa del Sol was one of the off-season variety.

People walking
Astride the Costa del Sol
What does that mean?
I ask myself.
"Astride the Costa del Sol"
The (can you hear the guitars?)
Costa del Sol
the costa del sol
The coast of the sun
in the sun, by the sun
The Sunny Shore.
Sunny still in January
Swimming with a
few late unripe English
Trying to force
A winter blossom
To their cheeks.
Some Spaniards
at home?
The few, the Proud, the...
Horrified!
Staring at my naked
feet!
In winter!?
Naked feet!
Ay!
My naked tootsies
Having made a first
Very timid step
Into
The rather chilly,
Rather polluted
(at an invisible level, of course invisible
this is the
Costa del Sol)
My bare California
Feet,
Stepping their first step
into the "Wine Dark Sea"
just down from the
small stream
with the cans
and the odd bits of paper,
running rather slowly,
but surely into
The Costa del Sol.
Where it goes on to pick up
a few more
Plastic jugs and more bits of paper
thrown there by
no doubt,
The few, the Proud, a Loud
and a rather Grave
Tourist
and yes,
the odd Spaniard
who must live
and revel
at his
Costa del Sol.
So we walk,
My friends my feet and I
Along this famous line of surf,
Picking up shells
The odd stone
Here and here and here
Black, with pink and white
Pin-striping-when-wet.
From this marine delight
I raise my film star eyes
To lock gazes with
A Spanish Lady
and her consort on
The Costa Del Sol De España
and she stares
she stares
and she stares
at my naked...feet.
Then she stares and stares
and stares and stares and stares and
Then stares into my eyes and
she stares into my film star eyes and
she stares into my eyes
Then gathering her
Thoughts
Into a tight
Ball of lightening
¡Contempt!
Throws them at my
foolish delight
In the color, and the sand,
and the sea and the sound
and the smells of her
Beautiful
Costa del Sol.