for the Spain they believed to be better: in Collioure
When the Spanish Civil War broke out in July 1936, the poet Antonio Machado was in Madrid. The war was to separate him forever from his brother Manuel who was trapped in the Nationalist zone, and from Pilar de Valderrama, who was in Portugal. Machado was evacuated with his elderly mother and uncle to Valencia , and then to Barcelona in 1938. Finally, as Franco closed in on the last Republican strongholds, they were obliged to move across the French border to Collioure. It was in Collioure, on 22 February 1939, that Antonio Machado died, just three days before his mother. In his pocket was found his last poem, "Estos días azules y este sol de infancia". Machado and his mother Ana are buried in Collioure cemetery. These photos were taken on Saturday 23 February 2019, on the day after the 80th Anniversary of Antonio Machado’s death. On the following day the president of Spain Pedro Sánchez visited this memorial.