Sitting today on the shinkansen bullet train, going down to Nagoya for an assignment, my mind for some reason drifted to Dublin, Ireland, and about 11 years ago….and to the time I saw an angel.

I was in Dublin, on a self-imposed exile from Scotland (for two weeks), I was walking to the pub (note TO the pub, not FROM the pub), with friends Stevie, and Miss K. (but Miss K. is another story altogether), ambling along a street pavement, houses to our left, old brick houses. Real houses, not like the Japanese houses. I forget the order of how we were walking, but I remember in kind of single file, not abreast.

I passed a window and as you do you glance in, and there she was, the first and only angel I ever saw. Sitting on a sofa, naked. Almost side on to me in profile, but not quite. She shone from within, an orange glow eminating from her, radiance all around. Beauty, sitting on a sofa, naked. Sitting upright, her hands clasped in her lap, her feet on the floor. I remember strongly that the light seemed to come from within her, and was strong, orangey, and only on her.

And in front of her, a fully dressed guy, kneeling on the floor. His hands held in front of him, as if asking the naked beauty for something, pleading with his angel. Their pose had been copied directly from a Rennaissance masterpiece, she sitting, lifted off the ground, looking down to the figure kneeling who returned her gaze, with his arms outstretched.

In an instant I was past, whilst my mind had stopped, my body had continued walking. I turned to my two companions, only Stevie stood with a smile on his face. He’d seen her, he’d seen the light. Alas, Miss K. hadn’t noticed the view through the window. We retraced our footsteps to take another look at this divine moment, to see again the angel.

But the curtains had been shut.